Wimbledon Bridge House bought by Hermes Real Estate for £58 million

Wimbledon Bridge House has been bought by Hermes Real Estate for £58 million.

The building contains 168,000 square feet of office space,  a car park and four retail units according to Property Week.

It is situated opposite Wimbledon’s rail and underground station and is fully let out to tenants including retail giants WH Smith and Next. The remaining space is taken up by six office tenants.

The London asset manager bought the space from Tristan Capital Partners and AEW Europe who had earlier purchased the space in September 2009.

Last year the building was bought for £40 million and AEW Europe’s Head of Investments Rob Reiskin said at the time: “We feel very comfortable with the pricing on this transaction given its high initial yield and significant discount to replacement cost”.

After the current sale to Hermes, chief executive officer of Tristan Capital Partners Ric Lewis explained that the firm will be searching for more UK investments: “The UK market, which has seen the fastest repricing in the recent downturn of any major European real estate market, is now benefitting from strong institutional investor interest, particularly in core assets”.

He continued: “This robust demand and attractive pricing is the background against which the fund decided to take profits for its investors after a relatively short period of time. We will, however, continue to seek additional investments in the UK that meet the strategic, diversification, and return targets of our funds”.

Hermes Real Estate is owned by the BT Pension Scheme. It serves a pension fund management function and fulfils a multi-specialist asset management role.