Wilton Developments has completed a forward commitment deal with Copley Point Capital to develop a 168,000 sq ft, four unit industrial and warehouse scheme at Turbine Business Park in Sunderland. Copley Point Capital along with its investors has acquired the four land plots and will make a balancing payment to Wilton Developments upon practical completion in September 2022.
Wilton has already secured planning permission from Sunderland City Council to develop four high specification warehouse units ranging in size from 20,000 sq ft to 68,250 sq ft at the 8.6-acre site located at the junction of the A19 and A1231 Sunderland Highway. With the funding now in place to bring the scheme forward, Stainforth Construction has been appointed to deliver the units and work will start on site at the end of November 2021, with completion scheduled for September 2022. This leaves Wilton with 3.5 acres at the front of the estate on which they will be applying for planning permission for 45,000 sq ft of small industrial/warehouse units.
Alex Whiting from CBRE represented Wilton in the transaction with James Yates from Avison Young acting for Copley Point.
The Industrial Agency teams at HTA Real Estate and Avison Young have been appointed to market the four units to potential occupiers providing a welcome boost to the severely constrained pipeline of high-quality, new build warehouse accommodation in the North East.
Turbine Business Park, which is already home to Vantec’s 422,000 sq ft warehouse facility, is strategically positioned off Nissan Way adjacent to Nissan’s car factory where Nissan recently announced a £1bn investment to produce a new generation of electric cars as well as a new Gigafactory to produce the batteries to power the vehicles.
Jason Stowe Managing Director of Wilton Developments said, “We have always recognised the strength of Turbine Business Park’s location in terms of connectivity and news of Nissan’s significant investment in the car factory has enhanced the profile of the location both nationally and internationally. Our forward funding commitment with Copley Point Capital has enabled us to ramp up development, with construction work starting on 29 November 2021.”
Nimit Oberoi, Head of Real Estate at Copley Point Capital said “We are pleased to bring these high-quality distribution warehouse units to the market and address the demand supply gap for Grade A stock in the region. We are actively funding new logistics developments across the UK with quality partners such as Wilton and currently on track to aggregate a portfolio in excess of £500m over the coming months.”