Unite Students sells £184m of university accommodation

Student accommodation developer Unite Students has sold a chunk of its estate for £184 million to fellow property investor PGIM Real Estate.

The six sites, across Birmingham, Cardiff, Leicester, Liverpool, Nottingham and Sheffield, include 2,948 beds, and are on average 18 years old.

Unite said it was making the sales to become closer aligned with “high and mid-ranked universities which have the strongest outlook for student demand”.

Bristol-based Unite is Britain’s biggest student-focused property firm, housing roughly 70,000 students every academic year across 23 university cities and towns.

PGIM Real Estate is the property investment arm of the US life insurance giant Prudential.

Unite said the sales are priced at the properties’ book value, and that proceeds will go into asset management activity.

Chief executive Joe Lister said: “These disposals continue our disciplined approach of recycling capital for reinvestment and further increases our alignment to the strongest universities.

“The growth outlook for purpose-built student accommodation remains compelling and we are tracking a number of new investment opportunities at attractive returns.”

It said in April that it had already reserved 86% of beds across its estate for the academic year beginning in September, amid what Lister called an “acute shortage” of student housing at its last full-year results.

Unite last month announced a pipeline of new developments worth £1.3 billion.