Stor-Age buys Storagebase for £59m as UK portfolio reaches 30 properties
The Cape Town self-storage fund's third UK deal this financial year takes its British footprint from 13 properties in 2017 to 30.
Stor-Age has agreed to buy the UK self-storage group Storagebase for £59 million, about R1.15 billion, the company said in an announcement to the JSE. The deal adds four properties in England to Storage King, the group’s existing UK platform, and is its third acquisition in the UK in the current financial year.
The Cape Town-based self-storage property fund’s three acquisitions this year cover nine properties at a combined purchase price of more than £100 million, roughly R1.9 billion.
The four Storagebase properties are in Banbury, Wednesbury, Frome and Amesbury and will offer more than 28 000m² in gross lettable area. Three of them, in Banbury, Wednesbury and Frome, are mature sites with a combined lettable area of 18 500m². The Amesbury property is under development and was scheduled for completion in April 2022, when it will represent nearly 9 500m² on full fit-out.
Stor-Age said the sites trade into dense residential areas and are above average in target size, which it expects to support operating margins. The purchase extends its presence in both the southwest and southeast of England.
A UK footprint that has more than doubled
The acquisition follows two earlier deals in the same financial year. In January the group bought a four-property portfolio in Leeds from McCarthy’s Storage World for £37.5 million, and in April 2021 it acquired the largest self-storage property in Blackpool for £3.6 million.
Stor-Age first entered the UK self-storage market in 2017 with 13 properties. Chief executive Gavin Lucas said the footprint has since grown to 30.
“The Storagebase acquisition itself, as well as the manner in which we have funded it, demonstrates the strength, competitiveness, and sophistication of our UK platform,” Lucas said in the announcement.
The group said the purchase would be funded through its R575 million capital raise on the JSE.
How the deal is structured
The acquisition forms part of an existing joint venture with UK real estate fund manager Moorfield, set up to assemble a portfolio of high-quality self-storage properties in prime locations in England. Stor-Age holds a 24.9% equity interest in the joint venture and earns management fees for acquiring, developing and managing properties within it.
The group also said the acquisition represents the second sustainability-linked loan facility it has entered into in six months with Aviva Investors, the global asset management business of Aviva plc. The new facility is a five-year, £30.8 million interest-only loan, aligned to Aviva’s Real Estate Debt Sustainable Transition Loan Framework. Stor-Age said the facility reinforces its commitment to its environmental, social and governance targets.
What it means for the group
The purchase deepens a strategy that has moved Stor-Age’s growth beyond South Africa. Self-storage is a small, cash-generative niche in listed property, and the group’s UK platform now carries a portfolio several times the size of the one it entered with in 2017.
The Storagebase sites add scale in a market where Stor-Age earns management fees through the Moorfield joint venture as well as returns on its own equity stake. The funding mix, a JSE capital raise plus a sustainability-linked loan from Aviva Investors, spreads the cost of the deal across South African and UK capital.
Stor-Age’s announcement was published through JSE SENS and carried by Moneyweb at https://www.moneyweb.co.za/news/companies-and-deals/stor-age-continues-to-add-to-its-uk-portfolio-with-r1-2bn-deal. The figures above are those the company stated.
