Beat a path to Trailfinders

INVESTORS seeking a return close to 13% on their €1m investment should beat a path to Cork’s Marlboro Street and to nos 40/41, home to travel company Trailfinders, which is occupying on a 25-year lease from 2006.

It is priced at €1m by Eoin Ryan of DTZ Sherry FitzGerald, and has a rent of €135,000, on upward-only five-year reviews, with a tenant break option in 2021.

Previously a pub, trading as Billy Morgan’s, it was bought ten years ago by developer Joe O’Donovan. It’s now being offered for sale for receivers, HLB McKeogh Gallagher Ryan, and was last on the market in 2012, for €1.2m.

“There’s no shortage of demand for investment in Cork right now, but there’s very little supply,” says DTZ’s Mr Ryan, name-checking the busy retail offers, such as Gamestop, on Patrick Street (€1.8m), AIB, on North Main Street (€900,000), and Bank of Ireland, in Ballincollig (in excess of €4.9m) — those looking at the latter won’t be fishing in the €1m investment pond of the likes of the Trailfinders sale, which is available to a wide pool of potential investors.

There’s about 1,500 sq ft here, at ground-floor and part first-floor (500 sq ft more) at the three-storey nos 40/41 Marlboro Street. It is close to Patrick Street and part of the city’s pedestrianised quadrant, along Oliver Plunkett Street and its spine streets.The property is occupied by travel company, Trailfinders, which was founded in 1970 and employs 1,000 in 29, seven-day-a-week shops in the UK and Ireland, with a presence in Dublin, Belfast, Cork and Limerick, with the latter opening in 2013.

“The expanding company has opened three shops in the UK since Limerick, last year,” notes Mr Ryan, who adds the Cork shop is on a passing rent of €135,000 per annum, which represents a net initial yield of 12.9%.

“This asset represents an attractive investment opportunity with a strong income, let to an excellent tenant with an appealing, unexpired lease term”, he says.

It’s offered by private treaty, just a week after DTZ launched Gamestop, on Patrick Street, as an investment, at €1.8m, and Cork DTZ MD, Peter O’Flynn, says this latest investment “will appeal to an array of purchasers, as the property occupies a prime position immediately adjacent to Patrick Street, the favourable lot size and lease terms on offer, and the strength of the tenant’s covenant”.

Details: DTZ Sherry FitzGerald, 021-4275454