- What Ponte Gadea has bid to buy Commonwealth House
- Why Nuveen has been exploring the sale of the building for £180m
- What next Terms have yet to be agreed and Ortega is competing against other bidders
Fashion Billionaire Amancio Ortega is making a £180m play to buy a mixed-use office and retail development close to the tycoon’s recently acquired Post Building in London’s West End, React News can reveal.
Ortega has bid to buy Nuveen Real Estate’s Commonwealth House at 1 New Oxford Street, WC1 through his Ponte Gadea real estate investment firm.
However, negotiations still have a way to run as terms have not yet been agreed and there are understood to be two other bidders which Ortega is competing against.
Commonwealth House would be a logical buy for Ponte Gadea given the building’s proximity to The Post Building – also on New Oxford Street – which the investor bought from Brockton Capital and Oxford Properties for £600m last year, as revealed by React News.

Nuveen instructed CBRE to explore the sale of Commonwealth House in February for £180m, reflecting a yield of around 4%, in a key test of pricing and market appetite during the coronavirus crisis.
If a deal is agreed, it would mark the end of Nuveen’s 15-year ownership of the building, having bought it in 2004. Having previously attempted to sell 1 New Oxford Street in late 2011, Nuveen – then Henderson Global Investors – opted to retain the 1930s art deco block and refurbish it instead.
Following the 2017 refurbishment, 1 New Oxford Street provides 95,000 sq ft of offices, a communal roof terrace and 12,000 sq ft of retail space.
- Ponte Gadea’s key London property deals
- –The Post Building, New Oxford Street: bought for £610m in December 2019 from Brockton Capital and Oxford Properties
- –Adelphi building, Covent Garden: bought for £550m in August 2018 from Blackstone
- –40 Shoe Lane: Ponte Gadea made it to the final three bidders for Goldman Sachs’ £1.2bn HQ in July 2018 but lost out to Korea’s NPS
- –Rathbone Square: Ponte Gadea bid for the building in February 2017 but lost out to Deka, which paid £435m
- –Almack House, St James’s: bought for £225m in January 2016 from Grosvenor Fund Management
- –6 St James’s Square: bought for £265m in January 2015 from Rio Tinto
- –The Gherkin, 30 St Mary Axe: Ortega bid for the building in October 2014 but lost out to Safra
- –Devonshire House, Mayfair: bought for more than £400m in December 2013 from a US consortium, including the Witkoff Group
- –Luminar House, 133 Oxford Street: bought for £150m in June 2012 from Deka
- –Jubilee House, 197-213 Oxford Street: bought for £165m in May 2011 from Cosgrave Property
- –215-219 Oxford Street: bought for £55.1m in October 2010 from Cosgrave Property