Derwent London is accelerating its disposal strategy, targeting £1bn in sales over the next three years on the back of strong momentum and sustained demand for prime office space in its 2025 results.
90 Whitfield Street, Derwent London
The London office developer has also announced the sale of 103,500 sq ft office building 90 Whitfield Street in central London’s Fitzrovia to Lone Star Real Estate for £110.5m.
The price reflects a capital value of circa £1,100/sq ft and a 5% net initial yield, and is slightly below December 2025 book value.
Jérôme Foulon, Lone Star’s global head of commercial real estate, said the firm had “strong conviction in the central London office market”. The freehold property is 88% occupied and has an annual passing income of £5.9m per year with a weighted average unexpired lease term to break of 3.7 years.
After making £616.1m of disposals in 2025, Derwent said it had exchanged on disposals totalling £33m so far in 2026 and had a further £240m under offer.
Sales in 2025 included 4 & 10 Pentonville Road and Francis House for a combined £80.1m, and 25 Baker Street for £135.9m.
The value of the firm’s portfolio rose from £5.1bn at the end of 2024 to £5.2bn at the end of 2025, an underlying increase of 1.7% including development opportunities.
The firm said it was targeting an “acceleration in disposals now the investment market is improving to ensure the alignment of our portfolio to evolving market trends and to provide capital for accretive reinvestment”.
Outgoing chief executive Paul Williams, who plans to retire once a successor is in place, called London the “HQ capital of Europe”, attracting significantly more investment than any other European city and driving demand for offices against the backdrop of a shortage of new space.
“This supports expectations for sustained rental growth, and our portfolio ERV [estimated rental value] guidance has been increased to 4% to 7% for 2026,” he said.
“We are forecasting 25% to 30% growth in EPRA earnings per share by 2030, driven mainly by the capture of growing reversion and the leasing of our developments.”
Derwent said it planned to selectively reinvest proceeds from disposals in a combination of development projects, acquisitions and share buybacks.
The firm said elevated costs of capital across the sector in 2025 had prompted it to review its approach to capital allocation. Out of the £1bn of target disposals, the firm has earmarked circa £500m as future development capital.
Taking account of Derwent’s planned acquisition of the Old Street Quarter for £239m, scheduled for late 2027, this leaves a planned surplus of £250m to redeploy into other opportunities.
“Succession planning has been, and remains, an important focus throughout the year,” the firm added.
Derwent completed 233,400 sq ft of new lettings worth £11.3m during the year, at an average of 10% ahead of ERV.
The firm added that £1.5m of new leases have been completed in a “strong start” to 2026, with space commanding £14.4m of rent under offer, including all the office space at its Network development in Fitzrovia.
Around £58.9m of asset management activity was completed during the year, leading to a 6.4% uplift in rents.
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