£450M Sale Launched For Debt-Laden Shopping Centre

The sale of one of the UK’s largest shopping centres, once owned by collapsed REIT Intu, has launched.

Knight Frank has been appointed to sell the 2.1M SF Metrocentre in Gateshead, north east England, according to a statement to investors that own the debt secured against the mall. 

The guide price is likely to be around £450M, and the sale will be seen as a test of the recovery in sentiment for large UK shopping centres and for large UK commercial property deals more generally. 

There is £693M of securitised debt outstanding against the centre, putting it underwater.

Those debt investors have a chance to vote against the deal, according to a notice circulated this week, but holders of 89% of the debt have already indicated they will approve a sale, meaning it is almost certain to go ahead. 

Financial occupancy for the centre was 91.4% at the end of 2025, up 2.5% from the end of the prior year. Footfall for the 11 months to the end of November was 16 million, up 2.7% on the prior year and the highest since before the pandemic. 

The Metrocentre’s ownership structure is complex. The centre was owned by a joint venture between Intu and Singaporean sovereign wealth fund GIC. But Intu went into administration in June 2020, and its ownership holdings are still being managed by administrators.

In addition, land around the Metrocentre is owned by The Church Commissioners, the body that invests on behalf of the Church of England. Plans are being worked up to build more than 4,500 homes on land around the centre. 

When GIC bought its stake in the centre in 2007, it valued the mall at £1.1B.

Investors are starting to warm to large retail centres after more than a decade in which they were borderline toxic. Redical completed a deal in March to buy the 1.7M SF Merry Hill centre in the West Midlands for £280M.