Empiric Student Property said its revenue occupancy for the academic year 2023/24 stands at 86% and continues to track significantly ahead of the prior record breaking year, in its latest business and trading update.
The student accommodation operator said like-for-like growth in average weekly rents for the upcoming academic year are expected to exceed 7% – up from the 6% it announced in March.
Empiric added it had exchanged contracts for the disposal of two non-core properties generating £18.1m – £0.2m above their 31 December 2022 book values – and continued to “actively consider a number of high-quality, well located investment opportunities that are complementary to our core strategy”.
Duncan Garrood, CEO of Empiric Student Property, said: “The booking cycle for academic year 2023/24 continues to track significantly ahead of 2022/23, which was itself a record year for the company. We remain confident in achieving occupancy rates above 97% and pleasingly, delivering rental growth in excess of 7% like-for-like, ahead of earlier guidance.
“The business is in great shape, our net promoter scores continue to improve and we’ve made good progress on our non-core disposal programme. We are optimistic that 2023 will be another strong year for the company.”
