Open storage
Open storage, sometimes referred to as land to let, storage yards or industrial outdoor storage (IOS) in the US, is an often overlooked yet vitally important segment of the industrial market. It provides a vital urban land use which is key to servicing some important and growing economic sectors.
The demand for outdoor storage spaces has been evolving from low quality sites comprising of hardcore and broken asphalt surfaces, and has become a highly investable sub-sector of the industrial market. Open storage property investments are now in considerable demand from high quality occupiers, witnessing strong rental growth in many markets.
What is open storage?
Open storage is land upon which equipment, products, items and objects (e.g. scaffolding, cranes, battery storage, construction materials, etc.) can be stored. It can also be used for off-site parking for trucks, van fleets, excess trailers and HGVs.
Carter Jonas is the leading property consultancy dealing with open storage land, developing the first four-tier system to classify sites to reflect the requirements occupiers may have. We are the only provider of services with a dedicated team of open storage facilities and infrastructure professionals.
With over 10 years of experience in industrial storage solutions, we can support you nationally from investment acquisition advice to site development, lettings and market reports as well as finding the right open storage space for occupiers, rent reviews and renewals.
How can Carter Jonas help you acquire and develop open storage yards
Our open storage team has a dedicated site finder that, through communication with agents and landowners, seeks storage yards before they come to the market, targeting areas where there are strong requirements.
This increases our market knowledge, particularly in forecasting which areas will see increased land values for open storage purposes, allowing us to work to find sites to fit our clients’ specific requirements. Once sites are found we manage the acquisition negotiations between vendor, purchaser and solicitors. We also work with our clients to advise the works required to optimise the rental income of their portfolios, propose rental incomes, and advise if a site should be let to single or multiple tenants, if multiple we can advise how the site should be divided.
How can you lease or let open storage
Carter Jonas acts for landlord clients to market and let open storage sites, as part of this service we provide market reports to advise clients on occupational demand, comparable evidence, ERVs and the classification of sites (using our own Carter Jonas Classification System).
Why choose Carter Jonas to help
Traditionally, open storage has been seen as low-quality space dedicated to scrap metal recycling, waste disposal or low-end HGV parking, however needs and growth of demand have transformed these often overlooked industrial lands into high quality storage spaces that can host high-end services and facilities.
Carter Jonas has developed four-tier system to classify open storage sites, which reflects the occupier requirements, and includes factors as accessibility, the type and durability of the surfacing, the level of security, the facilities and services and the location.
To read more in detail the four classes used to classify sites, click here >
The Carter Jonas research on open storage market trends
Our in-house research team produces a variety of reports covering all main asset classes of the commercial property market, including the Carter Jonas Open Storage Update research which explores in detail demand levels, rental trends, investment trends and development potential of the open storage market in the UK.
