John is the firm's national real estate sector leader. He has a track record of over 20 years in the sector undertaking property finance for lenders and borrowers with a focus on larger securitisations and portfolio funding (refinances/acquisitions/disposals).

John has several client partner roles, leading property finance relationships for the firm in the North East of England and providing strategic real estate advice in the commercial investment and operational property arena.

Experience

Examples of experience include advising:

  • On a 90m refinance of a £135m commercial portfolio of 90 multi-let properties delivered in a 6-week period and involving a national multidisciplinary team of 40 people
  • On the negotiation of the template documents, and designing the certification process, and then co-ordination of a team negotiating preparing, negotiating and issuing Certificates of Title in respect of 4,000 properties in the Places for People Homes Limited portfolio supporting a sale and leaseback to Legal and General with a sale value of c. £250m
  • The cross-firm team in the share sale of an offshore owned care home group for c. £40m including the client’s offshore accountant/tax advisers including negotiation of heads of terms with potential equity investor
  • The relationship with University of Northumbria at Newcastle including strategic real estate advice in relation to its real estate holdings, disposals of assets, and drawing on input from the wider real estate team and including NewcastleGateshead Core strategy representations by the planning team in respect of certain assets within the portfolio.

"A very clear and straightforward approach"


"He goes through everything with a fine tooth comb, identifies the problems, tells you what the issues are and offers up a solution"

Chambers and Partners