By Scott Reid

Copyright scotsman

One of Glasgow’s most distinctive office buildings has changed hands in a bumper property investment deal. Sentinel, which is prominently located on the corner of Waterloo Street and Douglas Street, is a landmark office building extending to more than 84,000 square feet over ground and nine upper floors. Lismore Real Estate Advisors said it had advised investment manager Ardstone Capital on behalf of the Ardstone Regional Office Fund – a joint venture with CBRE IM – on the £19.6 million sale of the development to Clydebuilt II Limited Partnership, a joint venture between Scottish property company Ediston and Strathclyde Pension Fund. Lismore director Simon Cusiter said: “The sale of Sentinel represents one of the most notable office investment transactions in Glasgow city centre this year, reinforcing investor appetite for prime, income-producing assets in Scotland’s largest city. “Ardstone Capital repositioned the building, helping attract high quality tenants and providing a platform for future performance. The quality of the building was highlighted by the competitive nature of the sale process.” Calum Bruce, fund manager of Clydebuilt II Limited Partnership, said: “Sentinel provides Clydebuilt with an attractive income stream which can be further improved through active asset management and the letting of the vacant floors. In a market with a limited supply of high-quality office accommodation, Sentinel is an attractive opportunity for tenants looking for new premises, with good interest already being shown by prospective occupiers.” The building is said to have undergone “comprehensive” refurbishment, with the most recent works completed in 2022. The upgrading has seen Ardstone attract a “high calibre of occupiers” including JLL, DWF, Chubb, Aggreko and Sedgewick International. A recent report from Lismore Real Estate Advisors examining the Scottish property investment market revealed that transaction volumes between April and June were “relatively healthy” at £296m, marking an increase of 9 per cent, compared to the same period last year. However, it noted that two transactions accounted for 48 per cent of total market activity in the second quarter, with volumes 21 per cent below the five-year average. Stripping out landmark transactions, such as Nuveen’s £100m sale of the W Hotel at Edinburgh’s St James Quarter to Schroders, and Sovereign Centros’ £54.4m disposal of St Enoch Shopping Centre in Glasgow to Praxis, total investment volumes were actually down on the same period last year, underlining what has been another “muted” quarter for the market, Lismore added. It said that in a landscape defined by “economic uncertainty and shifting investor sentiment”, consistency had become a “prized commodity” with Scotland’s logistics sector highlighted as a standout example. The firm noted that logistics had emerged as a “rare constant”, driven by strong occupational demand, critically low supply and renewed investor appetite. Lismore’s quarterly investor research indicated that sentiment towards Scotland’s logistics sector remained broadly optimistic. More than half of respondents (56 per cent) expected to be net buyers in the second half of 2025, with just 10 per cent anticipating they would be net sellers. Investors have ‘insatiable appetite’ for Edinburgh hotels but other sectors mixed