A SHOPPING park which is home to big brands including John Lewis, Next and Home Bargains is being sold in a deal worth almost £45million.

Poole Retail Park, off the town’s Branksome roundabout, has 14 shops and 805 parking spaces.

Its buyers describe the site as a “high performing asset” with opportunities to “extract further value and higher rental income”.

Contracts have been exchanged for the park to be bought for £44.7m by a joint venture consisting of the real estate investment trust NewRiver and BRAVO Strategies III LLC, a fund owned by the investment management firm PIMCO.

The joint venture is buying the site from LS Poole Retail Ltd.

Tenants at the fully-let park include John Lewis at Home, DW Sports, Next Home, Homesense, Boots and Home Bargains. Tenants have an average of 6.7 years left on their leases, an average rent of £18.24 per square foot and an average rent-to-sales ratio of 7.8 per cent.

NewRiver’s chief executive, Allan Lockhart, said: “We are delighted to announce the acquisition of Poole Retail Park, demonstrating further progress with our strategies to deliver underlying FFO (funds from operations) growth, by recycling capital from lower-yielding assets into higher-yielding acquisitions, primarily through joint ventures.

“Acquiring through this joint venture ensures we can maximise our returns on capital deployed through the receipt of rental income, asset management fees and promotes, while maintaining a conservative balance sheet,” he added.

“Poole Retail Park is a high performing asset that benefits from a very convenient location and a strong and diverse tenant line-up, and presents a number of exciting opportunities to extract further value and higher rental income through active asset management and risk-controlled development.”

NewRiver will hold a 10 per cent interest in the site and a similar percentage of its rental income, amounting to £400,000 a year.

NewRiver will also be appointed as asset manager, in return for a management fee based on the gross rental income of the site.

The joint venture, established in May this year, has acquired £105.1m of assets including the Poole site, with a net initial yield of nine per cent.

Poole Retail Park, previously called Poole Commerce Centre, is on the main A35 between Poole and Bournemouth, on the site of the former Redlands Pipes factory, which closed in 1981.