Two pubs and a number of industrial estates worth several hundreds of thousands of pounds each have been put up for sale as Nottingham City Council looks to strengthen its finances.
Some larger industrial estates, owned by the council, have been put on the market for auction with guide prices of more than £750,000.
Since the Government appointed an improvement board in 2020, following the collapse of Robin Hood Energy, the Labour-run authority has been selling off property which it deems ‘surplus’ to its needs.
The council agreed it would stop all borrowing as part of its improvement work, and the selling of surplus property is being used instead as a way to chip away at debt.
Through the Asset Rationalisation Programme, debt has been slashed from £1.2bn to around £900m.
The freeholdings to the Hole in the Wall pub, in North Sherwood Street, and the Navigation Inn in Wilford Street, near Castle Lock, have both been put up for sale.
This means the properties and the land they stand on are up for auction.
Admiral Taverns is the current leaseholder of both pubs, meaning it owns the property only and for a set period of time.
Navigation co-owner Jeanette Hill said:
“It is all good. We are still open and doing very, very well.
“[The sale] does not affect us, nor the Hole in the Wall. Admiral Taverns owns the lease and there are 15 years on it.
“I know Admiral is trying to purchase but it is closed business. Hopefully, they get it.
“It depends, at the end of the 15 years, who will buy it but that is a very, very long way off and I’ll be 75 by then, so I don’t plan on being behind the bar pulling pints by then.”
The news comes shortly after the freehold for the Fairham, in Clifton, was put up for sale.
Admiral Taverns, which is also the leaseholder for The Fairham, said the auctioning of the freeholdings for the three pubs would not impact trade.
Freeholdings for a number of other sites, including industrial estates, have also been put on the market.
Some have started to appear online at Auction Estates and Rightmove, under Nottingham City Council’s property services’ trading name, ‘Nottingham Property Plus’.
York House, at 15 to 17 King Street, is up for sale with a guide price of up to £700,000.
It is currently inhabited by Rosa’s Thai restaurant, which replaced the Loch Fyne seafood restaurant following its closure.
Industrial estates in Northern Court look set to make the city council some of the most significant sums of money.
Units 1 to 12, Vernon Place, in Northern Court, have been listed with a guide price of up to £775,000.
Units 1 to 6, Logan Square, Northern Court, have been listed for up to £500,000.
Numbers 8-10 Strelley Road, Aspley, a three-storey building inhabited by a Go Local store, has been put on the auction market with a guide price of up to £215,000.
Granville Court, Leighton Street, an industrial estate, is also on the market with a guide price of up to £315,000.
Other freeholds put on the market include 1.62 acres of land at Stamford Court, Casterton Road, which has a guide price of up to £360,000, as well as 1,387 square meters of land at 306 Lower Colwick Road, and land to the north of Prospect Place, Lenton.
Between 2020/21 to 2021/22, the council made £30.7m from asset sales.
It currently owns more than 3,600 property assets, including a number of farms across the country, with a collective value of more than £1bn.
A further £93m-worth of assets will be put on the market over the next four years.
• Victorian pub building in Nottingham to be sold by council
• Clifton pub freehold owned by Nottingham City Council to be auctioned next year
