This year in the Estates Gazette Rich List, the combined wealth of the 250 entrants is £306bn – a 40% increase on 2014 and the largest amount for any rich list in the UK since 1988.
The number is staggering and may be part of the reason property investment has a poor reputation among the general population. The fact that 250 people can have a combined wealth that is more than the GDP of an entire country – Greece’s is £240bn – and more than three times the annual budget of the NHS may not be the greatest advert for an industry trying to play down its excesses in the wake of the global credit crunch.
But, while the industry does do well at making money, it is also among one of the most generous.
A decent percentage of the wealth amassed by property’s richest is ploughed back into projects and causes that need it.
Looking at just the top 25 charitable givers in the Rich List 2015, some £306m was given away to support community, arts, religion, health and education (see table).
The debate is there, of course, that people should always give more.
Hotelier Rocco Forte, along with his family, is estimated to have a £320m fortune and he believes giving is the right thing to do – if it’s done in the right way.
“It is obviously right for people to do philanthropic things, but it shouldn’t be a lip-service approach,” says Forte. “A lot of companies say we are doing all these wonderful things and then they are running their business in a pretty dreadful way.”
He adds: “I think for some it is a personal thing and it is up to individuals to decide how they want to spend their money and if they want to give it to good causes or develop particular causes of their own which they want to support. I don’t have huge amounts of money to give, so can give to special projects, where even small amounts make a big difference.”
Heron Group founder Gerald Ronson, whose wealth this year is estimated to be £270m, has donated almost 1% of that, some £2.3m, to charity this year.
Through his Gerald Ronson Foundation, the developer of the Heron Tower in the City is passionate about helping young people, particularly with education, both in the UK and Israel.
“I am not interested in investing money in over-educating children. What I am interested in is giving people a step on the ladder,” he says.
Having built and funded schools here and in Israel, Ronson describes the opening of the Jewish Community Secondary School in East Barnet, Hertfordshire, in 2010 as one of his biggest achievements. The school will have 1,350 children of different faiths by 2017, when it reaches its full quota.
And, encouragingly, it is not just the older generation in the industry that is keen to help.
Fawn James, who along with sister India Rose, now owns the Soho property empire built up by their grandfather Paul Raymond, are big believers in philanthropy. The pair have a fortune valued at £482m, and as well as inheriting Raymond’s passion for central London, James, 29, has inherited a passion to put her own stamp on Soho through charity work.
“When I started with the company [in 2009] I was learning how it all works,” she says. “But I wanted to have my own thing to do within the company and I always wanted to be involved with charity.”
Before James joined Soho Estates the company did not have a corporate social responsibility policy.
“I wanted to implement one,” she says. “I thought, right, we are primarily based in Soho, so it seems like the ideal thing to support our area. That’s when I started narrowing down which charities to support.”
She began with the Soho Parish School on Archer Street, W1, and then turned her attention to the Terrence Higgins Trust – set up nearly 30 years ago at the start of the Aids crisis, and which now campaigns on a variety of sexual health-related issues.
“It seemed like such an important charity for the area, with the gay community and with sex workers obviously being a big part of Soho,” she says.
Soho Estates is also one of several property industry supporters of the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award.
So while the headlines for property may be about how wealthy its great and the good are, those same people are quietly their bit for charity. The majority of EG’s top 25 property philanthropists give away at least 1% of their fortunes to charity each year, and those at the top donate almost one-fifth.
Biggest giver: Ernesto Bertarelli
Ernesto Bertarelli, the investor behind Crosstree Real Estate, is the biggest charitable giver by value in the EG Rich List this year, giving away almost £67m in donations. However, the Bertarelli family is estimated to have a fortune of close to £9.5bn, so the donation reflects just 0.7% of its total wealth. The Bertarellis have been actively involved in philanthropy since the early 1970s through the Serono Foundation. The Bertarelli Foundation was formed in 1998 and provides investment for medical education, marine conservation and life sciences.
Most charitable: Sir Martin Laing
Sir Martin Laing, who was the last family chairman of construction firm John Laing and now runs Eskmuir Properties, is the most charitable by proportion of wealth given away in the EG Rich List. With £130m, Laing is 199th in our list of 250 wealthy property people. But he is streets ahead on the philanthropy list, giving away more than 18% (£23.8m) of that wealth. Laing set up the Martin Laing Foundation in 1979 to provide funding for environmental and conservation work, small community projects benefiting disadvantaged young people, the elderly and infirm, and Norfolk-based activities. It also makes a small number of grants to overseas projects, particularly in Malta and Thailand.
noella.pio.kivlehan@estatesgazette.com
