Life Science REIT completes second drawdown on HSBC facility

Life Science REIT has completed a second drawdown from its existing £150m debt facility with HSBC, it announced on Tuesday, totalling £37.2m.

The AIM-traded real estate investment trust said the drawdown was secured against its acquisitions at Herbrand Street in London, Lumen House near Oxford, and the Merrifield Centre in Cambridge.

It first announced the facility on 30 March, which consists of a £75m three-year term loan and a £75m revolving credit facility.

The company said it had secured additional protection against potential future interest rate rises through capping the SONIA rate at 2.0% until 31 March 2025 on the full amount of the term loan.

In total, £48.7m remained available in the revolving credit facility for future use.

The proceeds from the second drawdown would be used to progress the development and repositioning of assets within the existing portfolio as flagship life science properties, following “bespoke plans” capitalising on their “compelling locations”.

Life Science said the expected works included the fitout of laboratory space at Cambourne Business Park near Cambridge, and at Rolling Stock Yard in London's ‘Knowledge Quarter’.

“We are pleased to report further positive progress in developing a high quality and diverse portfolio of life science properties in the key national centres of this critically important industry,” said Simon Farnsworth, managing director at Life Science REIT’s investment advisor Ironstone Asset Management.

“The drawdown of this capital enables us to progress these properties to the next stage of their individual asset management plans and we look forward to providing further updates as the repositioning of these assets continues to evolve.”

At 0835 BST, shares in Life Science REIT were down 0.06% at 94.74p.

Reporting by Josh White at Sharecast.com.