Southend’s Airport (London Southend Airport) is proving to be a great driver for economic growth in the South East. The airport is one of the fastest growing regional airports in the UK, serving over one million passengers a year (up 37% last year) – with a target of five million by 2022. It’s been voted London’s best airport by Which? magazine for five consecutive years, and features large airlines such as easyJet, Flybe, Ryanair, Air France and Aer Lingus.
Ryanair will be opening its new base in April 2019 with 3 based aircraft (an investment of $300m) and 13 new routes to 8 countries. They have scheduled 55 flights per week at the airport and predict 1 million passengers per year. Ryanair’s Southend base will create 750 “on site” jobs alone.
The Airport Business Park under development, neighbours the airport and comprises of 20.88 hectares with a GDV of £150 million. It is another driver of job growth, and will provide approx 1m sq ft of office, industrial warehousing and complimentary accommodation as well as a pioneering innovation centre giving start-up businesses space to grow. The business park will host a large number of businesses and is expected to generate 4,815 new jobs.
The new Ryanair base, and Airport Business Park job creation numbers paint a great picture of economic growth for the area and increasing demand for quality rental accommodation. Southend has had a poor track record of matching supply and demand when it comes to new housing which is a contributing factor to house price growth. Montagna Property Partners are investing heavily in Southend through building new housing, refurbishing old housing stock and bringing it up to high quality accommodation for the rental market. If you are interested in acquiring investment properties in the area, please get in touch.