Logistics: clear height beats yield

The hard criteria

Clear height from ten metres, enough dock doors with levellers, floor loading for high racking, manoeuvring areas with sensible turning radii and access that works in rush hour. Fall clearly short on any one of these and you lose a large part of the buyer pool, regardless of the lease.

Third-party usability is the real valuation topic. A highly specialised facility for a single user is effectively an operational asset and gets priced as one.

• Clear height, doors, floor load: the three knock-out criteria
• Have roof statics checked for PV — this is now price-relevant
• Expansion land on the plot protects the exit

What has changed in leases

Occupiers negotiate harder on indexation and extension options. Full indexation without a cap is no longer standard at the prime end, and buyers calculate carefully what a cap means over ten years.

Maintenance allocation is being renegotiated too. Roof and structure with the owner is standard, but the boundary to building services is regularly drafted loosely.

On the financing side

Logistics still finances well, with comparatively attractive leverage for stable tenants. New build without pre-letting is tighter; a mezzanine tranche or a pre-letting condition usually enters the picture.