5th Dec 2025 12:20
(Alliance News) - Custodian Property Income REIT PLC on Friday reported an increase to its interim profit and net asset value as it hailed its rental and portfolio valuation growth.
The Leicester, England-based real estate investment trust said net asset value per share rose 2.9% to 98.9 pence at September 30 from 96.1p at March 31.
This reflects a 5.1% increase in portfolio value to GBP625.0 million from GBP594.4 million on March 31. The company attributed this to a recovering UK direct property market, with valuation improvement driven by the company's rental growth.
NAV per share total return was 6.0% in the six months to September 30, better than 3.6% a year ago.
Pretax profit rose 89% to GBP27.6 million in the six months ended September 30 from GBP14.9 million a year ago, fuelled primarily by the net gain on investment property and depreciation multiplying to GBP13.6 million from GBP1.7 million.
Rental revenue rose 4.9% to GBP21.7 million from GBP20.7 million, further supporting the bottom line.
There was a 3.3% growth in its European Real Estate Association earnings per share to 3.1p, from 3.0p a year ago.
Custodian Property Income declared an interim dividend per share of 3.0p, which was unchanged year-on-year.
Regarding the recent UK government budget, the company said it does not expects any of the measures to have a "direct, negative impact on commercial real estate investment".
Looking ahead, Custodian Property Income said it says the outlook is "positive" for real estate, adding that it anticipates rental growth across all sectors, though not all properties.
"The strong performance of the underlying assets should be expected to steadily flow through to listed property companies' share prices, but a further shift in market sentiment is required along with a willingness to consider the longer-term opportunity that exists in real estate," said Richard Shepherd-Cross, the managing director of the trust's investment manager.
"In the inflationary environment that is likely to persist, real assets that can be enhanced to deliver rental and capital growth will protect the real value of both shareholders’ investment and income. At the same time, we will continue to look for opportunities to grow through corporate acquisitions similar to the Merlin transaction we announced at the start of the period," Shepherd-Cross added.
Shares in Custodian Property Income fell 0.8% to 82.01p on Friday afternoon in London.
By Roya Shahidi, Alliance News reporter
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