Real Estate, Design & Development (Redd), a Monaco-based company known for the development and management of ‘super premium’ rental properties has set-up shop in London. Redd has reportedly already snapped up a number of high end investment properties in some of London’s most exclusive post codes, included Belgravia, Knightsbridge and Mayfair. The company belongs to Jacopo Marzocco, the 31-year-old third-generation scion of the French principality’s Marzocco family.
The Marzoccos have developed a significant chunk of Monaco’s most expensive investment properties, including the tax haven’s emblematic Tour Odéon skyscraper. A penthouse in the Tour Odéon was marketed for offers of over £250 million. The most expensive London apartment ever sold was a penthouse Nick Candy, the developer behind One Hyde Park, sold to himself for £160 million in 2018.
Redd first established a London office last year, spotting a gap in the luxury property market and presumably taking advantage of the depressed value of the pound since the Brexit referendum. The company has already built a starting portfolio of apartments and mansion blocks in ‘super-prime’ central London. A £15 million Mayfair mansion block that had previously been used as the London HQ of a ‘Greek shipping dynasty’ is among the investment properties acquired.
The top end of London’s prime property market has changed significantly since the 2016 introduction of a higher rate of stamp duty for second homes. A 3% ‘surcharge’ was added to transactions for properties not bought as the owner’s primary residence. This particularly affected the cost for foreign buyers who want a luxury London base but are not based full time in the country. The result has been a boom in demand for rental properties in central London’s most expensive postcodes. Redd rents out its own property portfolio, managed to the standards the super-rich have come to expect and offer services from dog-walking to cleaning and event planning.
London property professionals operating in the luxury segment believe Redd’s move into exclusive capital real estate is likely to precede a new wave of capital into similar investment properties. Lucian Cook, who heads up residential research at property consultants Savills commented for The Times:
“There’s a growing pool of domestic and international money waiting to exploit a perceived buying opportunity, subject to getting more clarity on what lies ahead politically and economically. Deal or no-deal Brexit, a bottoming-out in the value of sterling should act as the trigger to unlock pent-up demand.”
