Record year for Newcastle building consultancy and valuations teams

A Newcastle commercial property firm has reported a record growth for its building consultancy and valuation tams.

Knight Frank Newcastle has notched-up a 57 per cent increase in turnover for its building consultancy, and 22 per cent increase in the valuation team.

The building consultancy service, headed-up by partner Ian Tew, puts its boost in performance down to a rise in demand for both professional services and project work including an increase in acquisition surveys - particularly in the healthcare sector.

Key projects include managing the build of the £4m, 17,000 sq ft headquarters for Learning Curve Group at DurhamGate and the £12m multi-phased refurbishment and extension of the 500,000 sq ft Cummins campus in Darlington.

Ian said: “To say we’ve been busy would be an understatement and we’re currently recruiting to expand our team to increase our service offer.

“The majority of our work is repeat instructions from clients who are seeing the value in the insightful advice we can offer, which isn’t limited to the North East region, but UK wide.”

The valuations team, comprising Kevin Scully, Rob Flucker and Becky Gaughan, has seen turnover rise by 22 per cent since the 17/18 financial year.

Valuing large portfolios for clients including Adderstone Group, Hanro, Jomast and Northumberland Estates and an increase in work for major banks and investors have contributed to their recent success.

Kevin added: “The fact that we have a full-time dedicated residential valuer - Rob Flucker - is rare in the North East and this enables us to value very large mixed-use portfolios.

“We recently recruited Becky Gaughan who specialises in healthcare valuations so having Becky here means we can now value care homes, day nurseries and health facilities.

“I think the main reason we are doing so well is because we work hard and provide market-leading advice, supported by a strong agency presence, that our clients trust.”