West Midlands Police buys Brum headquarters

The West Midlands Police has bought the freehold of its Colmore Circus headquarters in Birmingham’s city centre in an off-market deal.   The police authority has paid over £15m to release it from a 51-year lease on Lloyd House after a deal was agreed with former owner R20 Group.   The 143,000 sq ft building has housed the police authority in its 11 floors since the mid-1960s.   Lloyd House is an integral part of the expanded central business district in Birmingham as it sits in the heart of Colmore Square next to Ballymore’s 1m sq ft mixed-use Snow Hill development and Carlyle Group’s 300,000 sq ft Colmore Plaza.   Robert Graves, head of property services at West Midlands Police, said: “The opportunity to buy Lloyd House came up and the attraction to us in owning the property is having much greater control and flexibility over our occupation and use of our headquarters, both now and in the future.”   GBR Property advised the West Midlands Police, while Colliers CRE represented R20. lisa.pilkington@rbi.co.uk