Resi developer Hub sets sights on £4bn portfolio

Residential developer Hub has set its sights on accruing a £4bn portfolio by the end of 2025. Group chief executive Robert Sloss told EG the company has added £950m GDV of schemes to its portfolio over the past 12 months, taking it to £3bn, with a further £500m under offer. The firm, which was established in 2012, has more than 8,000 homes completed or in development across the UK. Impending deals include talks with Lloyds-backed equity investor Housing Growth Partnership regarding funding for its £120m purpose-built student accommodation scheme in Leith, Edinburgh.  Sloss said: “If we do the £500m that is in talks now, that will take Hub to more than 10,000 homes and studios. If we could get to a £4bn portfolio by Q4 2025, I think that will be a very good passage of acquisition. “We are very fussy as to what we buy because we buy strategically.” Sloss said his team is focused on the delivery of what he calls “next-generation BTR product” – developments with less emphasis on amenity and more on making the buildings “as efficient as possible” from a sustainability perspective. Sloss said: “There is a much bigger rental market if you come down from the top 1% of rents. I know that’s an amazingly obvious thing to say but there is a bigger market out there and potentially more stable.” Last month the developer submitted plans to develop 275 build-to-rent homes and 180 co-living homes, alongside more than 10,000 sq ft of flexible commercial and amenity space on the site of the former Homebase on Pines Way in Bath. Sloss said the developer will also explore its plans for the next generation of BTR product in Romford, where it is in talks with Redical Holdings to develop 1,000-home around the Liberty Shopping Centre.  loss said: “Romford is a classic example of what will be such an upper quartile of rents in a very vibrant suburb of London.” Hub is also exploring integrating different uses of residential into mixed-use schemes. Sloss said: “I also see this hybrid of BTR sitting next to later-living BTR or to co-living and these interpretations of the living product in one scheme.” Image © Hub