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 Ireland
and the UK had the worst global commercial property returns in 2008 and
the current state of the US commercial market was highlighted on Tuesday,
when Boston’s John Hancock Tower, New England’s tallest skyscraper,
was sold at auction, at a 50% plunge in its purchase price, compared with
less than 3 years ago.
The London-based IPD Index, said in Johannesburg on Tuesday, that South
Africa's nominal returns of 13.0% on commercial property in 2008, were
sharply down on the 27.5% recorded in 2007, and the lowest in six years.
This performance is nevertheless the highest in the IPD indices for all
countries published to date and contrasts with the pattern seen across
Europe, particularly in the UK and Ireland, where capital values plummeted
last year due to yield rises across all sectors. The nominal total returns
for the UK and Ireland in 2008 were -22.1%, and -34.2%, respectively.
In Continental Europe, the spread of performance so far ranges from -4.7%
in Norway to 5.1% in Finland. In Asia Pacific, South Korea – which
returned 26.7% last year – came in at 4.0%, while Australia recorded
1.8% and, in North America, Canada produced 3.7%.
On Tuesday, Boston’s John Hancock Tower, New England’s tallest
skyscraper, was sold at auction for $661 million, about half its price
less than three years ago.
The purchasers bid $20.1 million for control of the 60-story building
and agreed to assume the $640.5 million mortgage. In 2006, Broadway Partners
and its founder Scott Lawlor, paid $1.3 billion for the property and defaulted
on short-term loans secured by the Hancock Tower and other assets last
January.
The building is named after John Hancock, the first governor of the Commonwealth
of Massachusetts, and one of America's Founding Fathers. His signature
on the 1776 Declaration of Independence document is the most prominent,
because of its size.
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Newsletter:
25 May 2012 2012 to 1 June 2012 - Dullstroom, Mpumalanga, South Africa
