Carmel House occupies a 100% prime retail location at the southern end of Fargate, which is the principal focus for retail activity in Sheffield city centre. The property comprises a new development of four quality retail units behind a retained façade totalling 3,809sq m (41,000sq ft). The building was fully pre-let prior to practical completion in August 2006 on new 15- and 20-year leases.

Tenants include a flagship store for H&M, a flagship branch for HSBC, Footlocker and mobile-phone operator 3G. Retailers including Marks & Spencer, New Look, WH Smith, Next, Virgin Megastore and Gap are in close proximity, while River Island is due to open shortly.

Oregan Financial is one of the country's best-known geared-pension syndicated commercial property investors. The company was represented by Andrew Gunne of CB Richard Ellis's International Investment team based in Dublin, and by Fergus Keane of CB Richard Ellis's Irish desk based in London.

"We are delighted with the acquisition of this attractive block of prime reversionary retail in Sheffield city centre, " says Fergus Keane of CB Richard Ellis, London. "All our research points to considerable growth prospects for rental and capital appreciation in Sheffield in the medium term. This is in part helped by the planned regeneration of the city centre retailing hierarchy including the long overdue Hammerson scheme, Sheffield One, anchored by John Lewis in the next four to five years. We feel prime UK retail looks relatively good value when you consider how sectors in the UK are currently trading, particularly as sentiment in the retailing sector appears to have turned the corner."

"Following a number of successful acquisitions in the office sector in the UK, we felt we needed to increase our exposure to prime retail in our funds, " says Joe O'Regan of Oregan Financial. "We liked this opportunity because of the prospects for rental growth in the micro and macro location, the quality of the tenants and covenant strength and the length of income.

"The fact that this building on this pitch attracted such high-quality tenants before the refurbishment was even finished speaks for itself. This purchase follows shortly after our recent sale of an office investment in Scotland where we returned circa 70% on equity to our investors after only 18 months, albeit significantly helped by yield contraction in that sector."