Great Portland Estates (GPE) has signed a new £250m unsecured term loan at a headline margin of 175 basis points over SONIA with three existing relationship banks.

The loan has an initial three-year term, which may be extended to a maximum of five years at GPE’s request, subject to consent from the three banks, NatWest, Lloyds Bank and Bank of China.

Following the deal, GPE has put an interest rate cap in place to protect against any further increases in rates whilst preserving the benefit of any reductions.

As a result, more than 90% of GPE’s debt is at a fixed rate or hedged.

The group now has cash and undrawn credit facilities in excess of £470m following the financial, which it says will be used to support the delivery of its strategic priorities. These include GPE’s near-term development programme and its £175m private placement debt maturity in May 2024.

GPE intends to incorporate ESG-linked KPIs into the loan in due course with the lenders to align with its existing £450m ESG-linked RCF, enabling the group’s performance against these KPIs to affect the future margin payable.

Corporate finance and tax manager at GPE, Holly Reynolds, said: "We are delighted to have arranged this financing with three key relationship banks.

"Despite more challenging debt markets, this new loan demonstrates the strong support that we have from our lenders for the clarity and ambition of our business model and our collective belief in the enduring appeal of London to both customers and investors."

As part of the deal, NatWest acted as documentation agent and Lloyds Bank will act as facility agent.

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