It looks like it is shaping up to be a boom period for the office space market in Central London. Great Portland Estates and Derwent London have both achieved strong gains, showing how the market is booming over the last week. However, the latest update from Land Securities is what really set the industry buzzing, with the company announcing they intend to start a speculative building spree in order to cash in on the shortage of office space in London as soon as possible.
While transactions were down slightly in April, following a robust 2010, those in the know do not expect London's position as the top performing property market in the whole of the United Kingdom to be changing any time soon. News of Google UK signing the biggest deal of the year so far, renting no less than 160,000 square feet of office space in the Central Saint Giles development for a period of ten years, which was announced last week, only further reinforces the strength of the London property market.
The boom time is not just for the big companies either, with many smaller firms also enjoying strong returns. The Alternative Investment Market and TSX listed Canaccord Financial is one of those firms, announcing last week that revenues for the first quarter of this year had risen to over £494 million, an increase of 40 per cent on the last quarter of 2010.
