Landlord Services

GCL’s agency team are acknowledged experts in the field of food and beverage and convenience store retailing. Through their unrivalled expertise in the field of turnover rents, GCL have for many years been securing the maximum affordable rent for schemes they are retained on. By adopting this philosophy, GCL are re-aligning the interests of the landlord and the tenant and thus creating long term partnerships, viable business units and ensuring that leases have a robustness and flexibility to deal with the vagaries (both known and unknown) of the trading environment.

GCL's philosophy is to move away from traditional and blunt methods of letting property by Zone As or rates per sq ft.  This has proved to be successful. We have delivered strong growth in rents by securing sensible turnover provisions. Also this methodology leads to a reduction in business failures.

When Turnover rents cannot be agreed this method of basing rents on agreed business plans do still have the benefit of being more sustainable and increases the tenants chances of succeeding whilst still paying a fair and affordable rent.

The issues with traditional methods of letting properties are:

• Not matching rent to tenants’ ability to pay
• Dependent on uncertain rent reviews for growth
• No growth for five years with traditional rent reviews
• Can lead to retailers either paying too much rent or not enough, both of which causes problems
• Does not allow for changes in market conditions

Advances in the travel sector market pioneered by GCL through turnover rents and reaching an agreed P&L with each individual tenant can now be seen as being beneficial for all sectors of the retail market.  The ability to work with tenants to ensure that the maximum affordable rent is defined and agreed ensures the following beneficial results.

• Intervention by the landlord to encourage growth leads directly to increased rent
• Landlords are encouraged to, and are also rewarded by, investing in the site because of the turnover-rent mechanism
• Base rents should move up annually
• Tenants are far more able to deal with the varieties of the market
• Reduced vacancy rates

GCL have recently been appointed to replicate the success of the motorway service area and travel market in High Street and shopping centre locations.  The philosophy of working with tenants to secure the maximum affordable rent applies equally well to shopping centres and high streets as it does to travel destinations.  If the events of 2020 have taught us anything, it is that the Zone A and rate per sq ft are now inappropriate ways to calculate rent and have become meaningless.

Tenant diversity, rents linked to tenants’ turnover, acknowledging that different tenants can afford different levels of rent using food and beverage and leisure as the new anchors are the keys to successful asset management of high street and shopping centre properties.

Our experienced commercial property management team can handle every aspect of your property needs - no matter the size and nature of your portfolio. We administer leases; deliver planned maintenance programmes; and handle reactive repairs for commercial properties including High Street retail shopping centres and transport hubs.

We deliver optimised property management services and bespoke reportings.

We can:

• Inspect your leasehold estate on a pre-agreed basis to check that tenants are complying with their repair and decoration covenants and to ensure that the property is maintained, safe, secure, clean and compliant, and to maintain accurate tenancy schedules.
• Provide service charge management for budgets of any size and deliver preventative and reactive maintenance programmes where required and can apportion and reclaim insurance premiums from tenants and manage any insurance claims.
• Manage void units, including business rates administration and inspections, to meet insurance requirements and to ensure vacant units remain safe and secure.
• Provide full tenant liaison services and attend tenant meetings where required.
• Instruct and manage dilapidations claims and oversee any works required for new tenants and to undertake any necessary due diligence. We can gain all approvals required for any tenant works and assist with granting landlord’s consent.
• Liaise with clients, tenants and solicitors to ensure the timely production of leases and other legal documents including licences for alterations, assignments and sub-lettings.
• Support clients with disposals including data room management, CPSE's, and the production of completion statements and other handover information.

We can provide client reports, on any frequency and in any format, including but not limited to:

• Tenancy Schedules
• Upcoming Lease Events
• Landlord Shortfalls and Liabilities (Caps and Voids)
• Health & Safety and Compliance Reports/Issues
• Maintenance Reports/Issues
• Utility Consumption Reporting
• EPC Ratings
• Rateable Values

The Accountancy Team at GCL understand that information and communication are key to the successful financial management of your assets. Our primary concern is the timely demanding and collection of all amounts due whether it be rent, service charge, insurance or direct charges. We work with clients to determine the appropriate levels, methods and formats of reporting based on individual needs and do not subscribe to a one size fits all approach.

• Demand and collect Rent as per tenant Lease provisions.
• Maintain a dedicated bank account.
• Turnover Rent: if required gather turnover information from tenants based on the frequency as stipulated in the lease, calculate the Turnover Rent and invoice the tenant.
• Carry out turnover based Rent Reviews where there are provisions in the Lease, agree the calculations with the tenant and increase the Base Rent accordingly.
• Carry out RPI Rent Reviews as required.
• Hold any Rent deposits in dedicated reserve bank account.
• Raise ad hoc recharges for insurance, dilapidations, works and other amounts as required.

Depending on the provisions in the lease, we can provide the following:

• Calculate tenant and Landlord Service Charge liabilities on an annual basis.
• Maintain dedicated bank accounts for each Service Charge.
• Advise tenants of their Service Charge liabilities and demand and collect accordingly.
• Ensure caps are kept up to date including calculation of RPI increases.
• Advise clients of void funding liabilities in a timescale that ensures that funds are received in line with due dates.
• Raise ad hoc recharges for utilities and other amounts as required.
• Reconcile annually including instructing and liaising with auditors if required.

• Manage purchase ledger process for Service Charge accounts, ensuring sufficient funds are available.
• Manage purchase ledger process for Landlord payments from Rents held.
• Approve purchase ledger invoices.
• Arrange payments and notify suppliers of payments made.

We can provide client reports, on any frequency and in any format, including but not limited to:

• Client Statements
• VAT Returns / Reports
• Management accounts
• Tenant arrears
• Cash flow forecasts
• Income projections
• Debtor history
• Expenditure
• Turnover
• Bank transactions
• Submit VAT digitally and make payments to HMRC.