Safestore profit up 23% as pipeline doubles

Safestore has boosted pretax profit by 23% after doubling its development pipeline. The self-storage firm said profit before tax for the year to the end of October was £498.8m, up from £404.6m in 2021. A rise in underlying EBITDA of 15.1% combined with an increased gain on investment properties of £381.6m, up from the previous year’s rise of £321.1m. Safestore added around 250,000 sq ft to its UK and Europe porfolio last year, folded its Benelux partnership into its main business and entered into a new joint venture in Germany. It has doubled its development pipeline to 1.4m sq ft over 29 projects, equating to 18% of the existing portfolio. That includes 11 UK projects, which will add 512,000 sq ft. The group is committed to being operationally carbon neutral by 2035. Chief executive Frederic Vecchioli said: “Over the last seven years, the group has developed or acquired 68 stores and expanded into four new countries – Netherlands, Belgium, Spain and now Germany. In addition, our development pipeline of 29 new stores, extensions and projects represents a further circa 18% of our existing portfolio’s MLA.” But it is the already developed unlet space that presents the greatest opportunity. “We still have 1.4m sq ft of fully invested currently unlet space in our UK, Paris, Spain and Benelux markets in addition to 1.4m sq ft of pipeline space. Our most significant upside opportunity is from filling our existing unlet space and that remains our priority.” The portfolio is currently 83.1% occupied, down from the previous year’s 85.2%. To send feedback, e-mail piers.wehner@eg.co.uk or tweet @PiersWehner or @EGPropertyNews Photo © Safestore