Sharp fall in commercial property

Some commercial property funds are putting delays on exits

UK commercial property investments suffered a record fall in the last three months of 2007, according to IPD.

Its UK Quarterly Property Index fell showed a fall of 8.7% on the value of investments in commercial property.

Falling values have led many investors to withdraw from commercial property, and some funds have introduced delays on when people can get their money.

Such funds have problems when there are lots of withdrawals because commercial property takes a long time to sell.

Friends Provident investors are having to wait six months to withdraw their investments while Scottish Equitable has introduced delays of up to 12 months.

For the whole of last year, the return on property investments was the worst since 1990.