Troubled former Birmingham student block goes up for auction
The 175-room Londonderry House in Birmingham city centre is set to be flogged off next month, with auctioneers at Bond Wolfe expecting a final selling price at around £700,000.
The eight-storey 1970’s-era office tower was built on top of a multi-storey car park on Newton Street as part of Birmingham’s post-war city centre redevelopment, but was successfully converted to student accommodation in 2001.
However, the 57,000 sq ft property has been vacant since 2021 after receiving a notice from the fire authority due to non-compliance with fire regulations.
A planning application lodged in 2022 by PBSA operator Capitol Students said that external cladding on the building is “not compliant with current safety standards”, with a £15m three-storey extension proposed to fund the “significant” re-cladding works required to make the building habitable again.
“In essence, the existing non-compliant cladding must be removed for safety reasons and these necessary works are one of the primary catalysts for the proposed development,” said a planning statement submitted by Capitol.
A scathing report by Birmingham City Council’s City Design and Landscape officers in response to the application described Londonderry House as a “poor example of 1970’s brutalism” which was considered a “negative building” within the Steelhouse conservation area. They described the building as harmful to the setting of several listed structures, adding that the tower block was “awkward and illogical” and at odds with the established development of the rest of the area.
“The proposal seeks to secure further value from a difficult site and in doing so will delay the proper regeneration by years. This is highly regrettable,” they wrote.
Despite the city council’s apparent antipathy towards the building, consent was granted for the three-storey extension due to the city’s ongoing need for student accommodation – but the work has never been completed, and consent has now lapsed for the scheme.
The building will come up for auction with Bond Wolfe on 9 July with a listed guide price of £695,000.
