Quinlan Private, a group of wealthy investors based in Ireland and led by Derek Quinlan, the owner of London’s Claridge’s hotel, looks set t...

Quinlan Private, a group of wealthy investors based in Ireland and led by Derek Quinlan, the owner of London’s Claridge’s hotel, looks set to acquire a prime piece of land in London’s Knightsbridge. The deal, yet to be finalised, is thought to be worth at least £500 million ($946.1 million) and represents one of the biggest deals in London commercial property to date. The land comprises a freehold island site of 23 properties, including shops, offices and hotels, close to the Harrods department store. Quinlan beat of tough competition from fellow Irish businessman David Arnold, who recently bought a major retail outlet in London’s Paddington, and Irish investment group, William Ewart. The Abu Dhabi royal family also bid for the site. The move comes after Sloane Capital, a group backed by Irish-based John Magnier and JP McManus, horseracing magnates and large shareholders in Manchester United, bought Unilever House, a prime office building on the river Thames. Sloane Capital is also spending more than £170 million on the new City headquarters of Standard Chartered. Wealthy Irish investors spent about £4 billion on British property last year. This year the amount is expected to go up to at least £6 billion. Property experts say the Irish are so keen to buy London property because of the much lower stamp duty (property tax) in the UK compared with Ireland, the proximity of the UK to Ireland and the desire to diversity property portfolios. Stamp duty is 4 per cent in the UK, compared to 9 per cent in Ireland. Irish property investors are also looking at the tax advantages of investing in low rental yielding property such as the Knightsbridge deal, where the rental yield is just over 3 per cent a year. Consequently, capital appreciation is more of a concern for many investors from Ireland, rather than income. They are also been helped by generous lending by Irish private banks such as Anglo-Irish Bank and Allied Irish Private Bank. The former is understood to have financed a large amount of Quinlan’s Knightsbridge deal.