Hyde shopping centre sold hours before scheduled auction

HYDE’S Clarendon Square Shopping Centre has been sold – without an auction bid even being made.

For just hours before it was set to go under the hammer, with an asking price of £2.5 million, a purchase went through.

As a result, it was withdrawn from the catalogue of items at the event on Tuesday, October 31.

And according to papers, more NHS accommodation could be put into the Healthy Hyde centre in what was B&M Bargains.

The NHS is also looking at the possibility of including a GP practice after making its desire to agree a lease extension.

Clarendon Square Hyde

Clarendon Square was sold just 14 months after its current owners bought it.

Irish firm Martin Property Group took the mall on from Dutch pension fund Stichting Mars Pensioenfonds (SMP).

Gary Martin, of the Martin Group, said at the time of buying Clarendon Square: “We will be focused on stabilising, repositioning and where possible developing the assets further.

“We are delighted to complete this transaction and become the custodian, particularly at time where shopping centres require hands on asset management.”

London-based Allsop, which would have run the auction, told how Clarendon Square brings in a total of £951,925 a year in rent from stores.

Documents revealed some of the 55 units cost more than £40,000 and £50,000 to rent annually and some are not scheduled to have their agreements reviewed until 2028.

As well as the stores, there are seven kiosks and even nine flats, which bring in a combined £62,940 over 12 months.

The emerging Hyde Masterplan, which includes the redevelopment of Clarendon Square, was highlighted in the positives attached to the sale.

As was Healthy Hyde, which opened in the shopping centre on September 22.

The struggles Hyde currently faces were told in no uncertain terms as 99 per cent of people told a consultation ahead of the masterplan being drawn up it could be improved.

Of 1,339 respondents, only four said it should stay as it is. 90 per cent of people who responded to a survey felt improved food and beverage shops and stalls are needed.

However, it was pointed out bringing new life to Hyde town centre will take between 15 and 20 years.

The main changes proposed include creating new pedestrianised areas around the town hall and the building to be ‘re-purposed to be a vibrant cultural hub for Hyde and the wider borough.’

Its markets will be re-located to ‘new, high-quality facilities in a prime location on Market Place,’ a re-imagined shopping area, with wide tree lined streets connecting all areas of the town centre and parking areas may be moved.

It is also hoped to create an improved public area, along with traffic calming to create safe, welcoming pedestrian routes from key public transport facilities.

A report stated, however: “The whole Hyde town centre redevelopment is a 15 to 20-year programme with short term, medium term and long-term goals that will holistically deal with the town centre and the surrounding area that feeds it.”

The Correspondent has contacted Allsop for information surrounding the sale of Clarendon Square.

 

4 Replies to “Hyde shopping centre sold hours before scheduled auction”

  1. They need to lower the rent on the stalls which will bring more people to shop it’s gone down hill in the last 8 years

  2. They need to reduce the parking costs it’s gone from 50p for 30 minutes as a minimum charge to £1.50 for an hour as the minimum

  3. Hyde, Ashton, Denton and Oldham used to have fantastic markets, lots of stalls, lots of choice, lots of bargains. Then along came developers who said they could make it better. The markets were killed off.
    Permanent stalls which were bigger made room for fewer stalls. More open space on the market ground made less space for stalls. I would imagine that there were large rent increases to pay for it which would make it a less viable business proposition for many stall holders so even fewer stalls. Proposed time scale for work over ran massively so people found somewhere else to shop. Once you lose your customer base it is hard to get it back. Then to add insult to injury, public transport from places like Glossop, Hollingworth and Tintwistle were discontinued so fewer customers. Improvements? have turned these four markets into areas of little interest now.

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