Stephen is a Partner based in our Birmingham office at Newmark. He has considerable general practice experience and specialise in rating and lease consultancy issues.
Stephen currently advises clients on all types of property including general industrial, variety stores, unit shops, offices, warehouses, licensed premises, retail warehouses, restaurants and specialist units such as pharmacies in order to mitigate their business rates liabilities. He is also one of the few rating consultants who has experience in dealing with large shop rating appeals and handle appeals nationally on behalf of clients such as The University of Nottingham, Loungers & Cosy Club, Merkur Slots, ATS Euromaster and Stonegate Pub Company.
As well as Poundland and Loungers UK Limited, Stephen is responsible for the day-to-day account management of several of our clients. He offers them strategic advice to ensure that all available opportunities are taken to minimise cost liabilities but to maximise operational efficiencies across these sometimes-diverse portfolios.
Key projects
- Loungers UK Limited: unhappy with their previous advisors, they instructed us on their portfolio in 2010 when they had around 50 sites. We were able to generate them rates savings in the order of £410,000. Since then, they have built on their initial successes and, through strategic acquisitions, now stand at just over 250 sites. Given our track record in the A3/A4 sector, dealing with some of the lease consultancy issues on their sites specifically and having an extremely competent rating offering, we have been able to secure them 2017 list rates savings equating to just under £1.6m.
- Saint-Gobain Building Distribution Limited: identifying through comparison of rental evidence and the corresponding RV’s that this class of property had been overvalued, entering into central negotiations with the Valuation Office Agency and agreeing a revised scheme of classification and valuation on a significant number of their sites. Settlements and revisions of assessment across the portfolio on the back of this initiative with total savings over the life of the list equated to over £4.5m.
