Lodhas buy iconic London bldg for £300m

Mumbai: In one of the biggest real-estate deals this year, the Lodha Group has bought the iconic MacDonald House, a five-storey office-cum-home of the Canadian High Commission in London, for £300 million (around Rs 3,000 crore), giving it a toehold in the global real estate business. 

    It has a total floor area of 160,000 sq ft (gross internal area) and is built on a land area of 0.67 acres. Canada had bought the building from the US government in the 1960s. Lodha plans luxury homes on London plot 
Mumbai: The Lodha Group has bought the iconic Macdonald House in London. In February, the Canadian government had put on sale the palatial building, named after the country's first prime minister Sir John A MacDonald, to cash in on London's surging real estate market. 
    Industry sources said the deal was signed on Thursday after Lodha paid the entire bid amount, making it the group's first major property acquisition abroad. Four to five bidders from the Middle East and Asia were also in the fray for the property, whose reserve price was 250 million pounds. 
    International property consultants said the building is located off Grosvenor Square in Mayfair, one of the most desirable areas in London and prices here can reach up to 2,000 pounds a sq ft. "Lodha is planning to construct a highend luxury residential building here. The construction, however, will not start till next year as London planning authorities have not changed the use from commercial to residential,'' said consultants close to Lodha Group. 
    Abhishek Lodha, managing director of Lodha Group, did not respond to queries seeking comment while the Canadian Embassy could not be contacted. 
    Incidentally, this is the second property owned by a foreign government purchased by the Lodha Group. Last December, it bought Washington House, staff quarters of the US consulate on Altamount road in Mumbai, for Rs 342 crore.
    Lodha's MacDonald House buy comes three years after Sahara India Pariwar in 2010 acquired the iconic Grosvenor House hotel in London for 470 million pounds. Sahara has put the hotel back on the block.