Westgate (Midlands) Ltd, 19A Forester Street, Netherfield

This one is close to home as the property is owned by my parents and is the headquarters of our family business 'Westgate (Midlands) Ltd'. To the rear of the main warehouse is a two-storey building the first floor of which has been let to tenants for years. Since my parents bought the building, they’ve been fortunate to have had only two different tenants, who between them occupied the space for over 20 years.

When the space came vacant in 2017 it was time for a re-think in terms of how to maximise the return from the property. We marketed the property through Fisher German as I was working there at the time and subsequently moved the listing across to Harris Lamb when I took on my role there in October 2018.

Initially there was little interest in the property, which led us to rethink the target market. Historically, the space had been used for light manufacturing, but we decided to target alternative sectors, including sports and fitness, serviced offices and education.

Utilising my network of contacts in those sectors and an effective marketing campaign we generated a number of enquiries, one of which came from Venture Learning (VL), a new start up in the education sector providing education to students who had struggled in mainstream schools. Their focus was to rebuild a youngster’s relationship with learning and bring them back into mainstream education.

The negotiation process between myself and VL was positive, with landlord and tenant both keen to be reasonable to accommodate the other’s needs. The property needed a substantial refurbishment to make it a fit environment and also a change of use. VL agreed to lease terms which reflected the landlord’s commitment to providing a suitable space for their business.