UK retailers have now paid 60 percent of rents owed for June quarter

Retail landlords have now received 60 percent of rents due for the June quarter, new data shows.

It’s a marked improvement from the 13.8 percent paid by the retail sector on June’s rent day, but still lags behind the industrial and office sectors performing significantly better at 75 percent and 76 percent, respectively.

Overall, commercial tenants in the UK had paid 68 percent of rent, up from 18.2 percent on the due date. That’s according to the latest figures from cloud-based commercial property management platform Re-Leased.

Re-Leased CEO Tom Wallace commented: “Over the course of the June quarter, rent collection climbed from a sobering 18.2% on due date to 68% by day 60, which is on par with March Quarter’s performance. Though unlike March - where organisations would have been operating as normal for the majority of the first quarter of the year - businesses across the UK felt the full force of lockdown measures for June.

“On one hand this shows there is a degree of resilience in the market, however, the shortfall in income for landlords over both quarters should not be underestimated. This is a substantial level of debt that runs into the billions, placing huge pressure on landlords.”

The British Property Federation estimates total unpaid rent for UK commercial property from late March to the end of December will be around 4.5 billion pounds.

Wallace continued: “All eyes are now on 29th September and what the next quarter will bring. With new restrictions for businesses announced on the 22nd of Sep by the government and the extension of the rent moratorium the week prior, there is a strong suggestion that the improvement in rent collections may not come to fruition. As a consequence, we predict very similar rental collection figures to the prior two quarters.”

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