Redeveloping Commercial property to meet the demands of the UK’s property deficit is a highly cyclical and risky business and finding the perfect property for development does not happen by chance. The ability to determine your property investment needs, identify problem areas and ask the right questions can be the difference between profit and loss.
Over the last few years more and more people are choosing to convert former
public houses into private residential dwellings. The traditional British pub is currently under threat as never before. A combination of factors has led to more and more pub owners shutting down pubs and seeking to convert the buildings to other uses; Footfall in all pubs has gone down two-thirds in the last twenty years, and there just isn't the demand that there used to be. Beer sales are falling by 20pc year on year and pubs are closing at the rate of 5 a day. The price of freehold pubs continues to fall, as breweries, pub chains and pub companies offload unprofitable, struggling,
run down or vacant pubs.
But finding the ideal pub site to redevelop is not always that simple. There are issues with finding finance for the purchase of a commercial building, VAT to be considered but perhaps most important are the issues of
change of use and planning.
Paramount Investments specialise in the sale of licensed and commercial properties and Sales Director, Steve Oliver has been selling pubs, wine bars, hotels and restaurants for the last 8 years;
" Some of our commercial properties already have planning permission for redevelopment. Pubs have a
flexible A4 planning ‘business use class’ that normally can be changed to A1 use (say, for a newsagents), A2 (a delicatessen or a firm of solicitors or architects) or A3 (restaurants). And if you buy a property with
planning permission, you can get on with your property development, modernisation or refurbishment project straight away."
