Developer continues Dublin asset selldown with proposed disposal of fully let offices and lands at Northwood in Santry Demesne
Joint agents Hooke and MacDonald and Savills are guiding a price of €48.5 million for the Swift Square and Metro Park Collection, a portfolio comprising prime suburban offices and two residential sites in north Dublin. Located at Northwood in Santry Demesne, the properties are being sold on behalf of the Cosgrave Property Group as part of its ongoing divestment of assets in Dublin and the Greater Dublin Area.
That process has already seen the developer dispose of the Meridian Centre in Greystones, Co Wicklow and Gulliver’s Retail Park in Santry in separate transactions worth €7 million and €30 million in the final quarter of 2023 and first quarter of this year respectively. The arrival of the Swift Square and Metro Park Collection to the market, meanwhile, comes just seven weeks after the Cosgrave Property Group put the West Pier Business Campus in Dún Laoghaire, south Dublin up for sale with agent JLL at a guide price of €19 million.
The Swift Square and Metro Park Collection is being offered to prospective purchasers in one or more lots.
Lot 1 (Swift Square) comprises two fully let office blocks, namely 1 and 2 Swift Square, and an adjoining car park/residential site with full planning permission for 192 apartments. Block 2 is let to the ESB in its entirety while Block 1′s 10-strong tenant line-up includes BMW, Close Brothers, the National Standards Authority of Ireland (NSAI) and Affidea. The weighted average unexpired lease term is 3.1 years to break and 5.9 years to expiry.
Designed by McCrossan O’Rourke Manning, the Swift Square development provides for 192 apartments in three blocks ranging in height from four to nine storeys over basement parking (Planning ref: ABP-318108-23). Located on the site of the existing offices’ surface car park, the scheme is composed, in the main, of two-bedroom apartments along with residents’ amenity space.
These include a concierge reception, a gym and multifunction space, as well as communal open spaces and parking for 362 cars, 33 motorcycles and 522 bicycles. A total of 254 of the car parking spaces will be for the benefit of the existing office buildings.
The guide price for Lot 1 is €38.5 million, and this element of the overall portfolio offers the prospective buyer a yield of 9.9 per cent based on the current contracted rent of €4,193,179 per annum.
Lot 2 comprises the Metro Park residential development site, which extends to 1.47 hectares (3.6 acres). Although this land does not have planning permission in place, a feasibility study prepared in advance of the sale suggests it could accommodate up to 502 apartments. Located next to Gulliver’s Retail Park and Santry Demesne, the site derives its name from its close proximity to the proposed future underground metro station which is planned as the second stop south of Dublin Airport on the rail line between Swords and Dublin city centre. The site is zoned MRE – Metro and Rail Economic Corridor under the Fingal Development Plan 2023-2029, the objective of which is to provide for “employment generating activity and commercial development, and to support the provision of an appropriate quantum of residential development…”.
The feasibility study drawn up by McCrossan O’Rourke Manning Architects indicates the potential for the development of 502 one- and two-bedroom apartments, and four commercial units, in four blocks over basement car parking with a car parking ratio of 0.5 spaces per unit. The Metro Park site is guiding at a price of €10 million, which equates to €19,920 per site.
Lot 3 comprises the entire portfolio and is guiding at an overall price of €48.5 million.
The Swift Square and Metro Park sites are located in Northwood at Santry Demesne in north Dublin. Situated off Northwood Avenue and within a short distance of Dublin Airport, the city centre, IFSC and the docklands, Northwood is home already to multiple asset classes including offices; medical; high and low-density residential; a nursing home; gym; large box and neighbourhood retail; a hotel, and numerous leisure amenities.
