Valley and Sparrows Lane lease extended to 2040

TootingRedArmy said:

We need Roland out, and I hope the owners will focus on this. Yes they have lease but hopefully looking at ways to buy him out, owning Valley and training ground with the team is only way forward in the long term. The Valley is a brilliant stadium, The Jimmy Seed stand gives us plenty of opportunity to expand and complete the stadium, joining the ES & WS stands. A Valley with 30-35K maximum is achievable without great expense. There is no point getting ahead of ourselves we need to establish our position in Championship for a few seasons and hopefully then push on.

thewolfboy said:

Pleased we are secure in playing at The Valley for another 15 years. We have a better stadium than Palace, Millwall and West Ham, imo, which is pretty cool when you think about it.

LargeAddick said:

TootingRedArmy said:

Charlton fans fought long and hard to bring our club back to The Valley, thanks to endeavours of our fan base and there’s no reason to ever move away. Let’s hope one day we get the right owner or investment to finally complete the stadium and connect all four sides.

The first goal, of course, is to re-establish Charlton as a solid Championship club after nine years in League One (bar one!). American investment seems the likely route, like it or not, that’s where the EFL is heading, with clubs like Wrexham and Birmingham leading the way.

Charlton remains a fantastic opportunity for any investor: a proud London club with history, potential, and passionate support. Get it right on the pitch, and the crowds will follow and The Valley can be developed into a 30-35K stadium with not excessive costs.  COYA's

You do realise we are American owned?

TOOTING RED ARMY : YES thanks, I know we are American owned, I was trying to say that our owners or other investors hopefully can be put $$$$££££ into our club and effectively buy back the Valley so it can be developed. I don't know what might be permitted, whether JS can be joined to ES + WS or JS or any of the other stands can be enlarged. I remember plans for a 40K Valley? but 35K would be fine if its possible to develop the Valley's capacity?
ATM the Valley is a perfect iconic Championship ground, I doubt we will see a sell out this season unless we have a charge to the Play Offs at the end of the season.
The main focus has to be investing in Jones and the team but The Valley's future needs to be  sorted out ideally and not put to bottom of the in-try and we get shot of that ageing Belguim fool Roland finally .....

stoneroses19 said:

matt88 said:

TootingRedArmy said:

We need Roland out, and I hope the owners will focus on this. Yes they have lease but hopefully looking at ways to buy him out, owning Valley and training ground with the team is only way forward in the long term. The Valley is a brilliant stadium, The Jimmy Seed stand gives us plenty of opportunity to expand and complete the stadium, joining the ES & WS stands. A Valley with 30-35K maximum is achievable without great expense. There is no point getting ahead of ourselves we need to establish our position in Championship for a few seasons and hopefully then push on.

Fairly sure that the selling off of that land on Lansdowne Mews for housing means that we won’t be able to ever join the corners up now. Can’t remember which regime sold it off but sure Airman wrote about it before.

From memory, and therefore probably wrong, I thought the housing built behind meant that we could never extend East Stand (as in double tier to match West), but there would be space for the corners of Jimmy Seed.  

Bostonaddick said:

There is absolutely no incentive for Roland to negotiate in earnest.  The Valley is a single use asset with a single potential buyer who has a lot of reasons not to move and is a sunk cost for him. As long as he is getting rental payments, and is not experiencing financial difficulties, why would he negotiate.  He holds all the leverage. There are really only two potential purchase outcomes.  1) we get into the premier league and become established enough there that Roland’s asking price becomes financially feasible 2)we get to the end of the lease and seriously consider moving forcing him to negotiate but we still need owners at the time that who would be willing to pay over market value.  The second option is unlikely given the owners would either be paying a significant sum for the Valley or a significant sum to develop a new stadium.  Neither of which would have any kind of financial ROI unless you are in the premier league 

matt88 said:

TootingRedArmy said:

We need Roland out, and I hope the owners will focus on this. Yes they have lease but hopefully looking at ways to buy him out, owning Valley and training ground with the team is only way forward in the long term. The Valley is a brilliant stadium, The Jimmy Seed stand gives us plenty of opportunity to expand and complete the stadium, joining the ES & WS stands. A Valley with 30-35K maximum is achievable without great expense. There is no point getting ahead of ourselves we need to establish our position in Championship for a few seasons and hopefully then push on.

Fairly sure that the selling off of that land on Lansdowne Mews for housing means that we won’t be able to ever join the corners up now. Can’t remember which regime sold it off but sure Airman wrote about it before.

YTS1978 said:

Airman Brown said:

YTS1978 said:

SoundAsa£ said:

YTS1978 said:

A quick Google finds this...so i was kind of right. Seems like a lifetime ago!

https://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/mobile/football/teams/c/charlton_athletic/8001820.stm

Cannot open?

From BBC at the time:

Charlton have sold their training ground to the club's directors in an attempt to inject money into the club.

The deal for £1.5m sees three sites used for training sold to chairman Richard Murray and honorary life president Sir Maurice Hatter.

Murray told the club's official website: "It might look like asset-stripping is going on, but that certainly isn't the case."

Charlton are bottom of the Championship, 12 points from safety.

The sale of the club's training ground, the Community Trust's Charlton Park rugby ground and the youth academy's Pippenhall sports ground was approved by Charlton plc shareholders on Wednesday.

Murray's Alliance Trust Pensions Limited and Sir Maurice's registered charity, The Maurice Hatter Foundation, made the purchases.

"The three key points are that the assets are in friendly hands, it's a 25-year lease, and if the club wants the facilities back, it can buy them back," said Murray.

"The three resolutions were all approved, so that was good. We explained the logic behind the decisions, and that Charlton won't suffer but will only benefit."

"The 25-year lease means the club has security of tenure and if, by any chance, the club came into some money which it wanted to invest back into the training ground, it's got an option to buy the training ground back."

"As most people will be aware, the directors have pumped a lot of money into the club and unfortunately, people like myself have just come to the end of their financial clout."

A residential site owned by the club near to the Valley, Lansdowne Mews, has also been sold as part of the deal to Bob Whitehand.

Definitely not asset stripping!

This was agreed but never happened.

The reason the assets were separated from the football company in 1992 was to protect them if the football company went bust - nothing more, nothing less. Holdings was a wholly owned subsidiary of the PLC (it had the same owners as the football company at all times). The PLC became Baton 2010 and Roland sold the football company out of it in 2020.

Catching up on the thread....but this was agreed, published on our own website and by the bbc, but then never happened? How strange?! I would call "bullshit" but what would i know? "It is what it is" as Lee Bowyer used to to say lol

fenaddick said:

Airman Brown said:

Weegie Addick said:

Airman Brown said:

YTS1978 said:

SoundAsa£ said:

YTS1978 said:

A quick Google finds this...so i was kind of right. Seems like a lifetime ago!

https://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/mobile/football/teams/c/charlton_athletic/8001820.stm

Cannot open?

From BBC at the time:

Charlton have sold their training ground to the club's directors in an attempt to inject money into the club.

The deal for £1.5m sees three sites used for training sold to chairman Richard Murray and honorary life president Sir Maurice Hatter.

Murray told the club's official website: "It might look like asset-stripping is going on, but that certainly isn't the case."

Charlton are bottom of the Championship, 12 points from safety.

The sale of the club's training ground, the Community Trust's Charlton Park rugby ground and the youth academy's Pippenhall sports ground was approved by Charlton plc shareholders on Wednesday.

Murray's Alliance Trust Pensions Limited and Sir Maurice's registered charity, The Maurice Hatter Foundation, made the purchases.

"The three key points are that the assets are in friendly hands, it's a 25-year lease, and if the club wants the facilities back, it can buy them back," said Murray.

"The three resolutions were all approved, so that was good. We explained the logic behind the decisions, and that Charlton won't suffer but will only benefit."

"The 25-year lease means the club has security of tenure and if, by any chance, the club came into some money which it wanted to invest back into the training ground, it's got an option to buy the training ground back."

"As most people will be aware, the directors have pumped a lot of money into the club and unfortunately, people like myself have just come to the end of their financial clout."

A residential site owned by the club near to the Valley, Lansdowne Mews, has also been sold as part of the deal to Bob Whitehand.

Definitely not asset stripping!

This was agreed but never happened.

The reason the assets were separated from the football company in 1992 was to protect them if the football company went bust - nothing more, nothing less. Holdings was a wholly owned subsidiary of the PLC (it had the same owners as the football company at all times). The PLC became Baton 2010 and Roland sold the football company out of it in 2020.

Err the football company wasn’t Roland’s to sell in 2020? That was Sandgaard buying from ESI 1 despite the injunction by ESI 2?

Err you need to check your facts. The football company was sold by Roland to ESI in January 2020.

This is also why the 15 year lease ran until a date in January 2035. You are confusing the publicity with the transaction.

Sale in 2019 but ratified by the EFL in 2020 no? Unless the sale didn't officially go through until the EFL said yes?

Airman Brown said:

YTS1978 said:

matt88 said:

TootingRedArmy said:

We need Roland out, and I hope the owners will focus on this. Yes they have lease but hopefully looking at ways to buy him out, owning Valley and training ground with the team is only way forward in the long term. The Valley is a brilliant stadium, The Jimmy Seed stand gives us plenty of opportunity to expand and complete the stadium, joining the ES & WS stands. A Valley with 30-35K maximum is achievable without great expense. There is no point getting ahead of ourselves we need to establish our position in Championship for a few seasons and hopefully then push on.

Fairly sure that the selling off of that land on Lansdowne Mews for housing means that we won’t be able to ever join the corners up now. Can’t remember which regime sold it off but sure Airman wrote about it before.

I posted that story earlier in the thread which included the selling of the training grounds and landsdowne mews. Airman said it wasnt true, but I think he was specifically replying to the training facilities,  not the housing.

The board (the parent company to be clear) sold the land for the housing direct. It didn’t go through Bob Whitehand’s company as agreed by the shareholders. Those transactions never completed. Sparrows Lane was never transferred at all.

Famously, (senior) staff were not told the land at Lansdowne Mews had been sold (under Waggott as chief exec) and got onto a dispute with the purchaser over its use for disabled parking.

Airman Brown said:

Weegie Addick said:

Airman Brown said:

YTS1978 said:

SoundAsa£ said:

YTS1978 said:

A quick Google finds this...so i was kind of right. Seems like a lifetime ago!

https://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/mobile/football/teams/c/charlton_athletic/8001820.stm

Cannot open?

From BBC at the time:

Charlton have sold their training ground to the club's directors in an attempt to inject money into the club.

The deal for £1.5m sees three sites used for training sold to chairman Richard Murray and honorary life president Sir Maurice Hatter.

Murray told the club's official website: "It might look like asset-stripping is going on, but that certainly isn't the case."

Charlton are bottom of the Championship, 12 points from safety.

The sale of the club's training ground, the Community Trust's Charlton Park rugby ground and the youth academy's Pippenhall sports ground was approved by Charlton plc shareholders on Wednesday.

Murray's Alliance Trust Pensions Limited and Sir Maurice's registered charity, The Maurice Hatter Foundation, made the purchases.

"The three key points are that the assets are in friendly hands, it's a 25-year lease, and if the club wants the facilities back, it can buy them back," said Murray.

"The three resolutions were all approved, so that was good. We explained the logic behind the decisions, and that Charlton won't suffer but will only benefit."

"The 25-year lease means the club has security of tenure and if, by any chance, the club came into some money which it wanted to invest back into the training ground, it's got an option to buy the training ground back."

"As most people will be aware, the directors have pumped a lot of money into the club and unfortunately, people like myself have just come to the end of their financial clout."

A residential site owned by the club near to the Valley, Lansdowne Mews, has also been sold as part of the deal to Bob Whitehand.

Definitely not asset stripping!

This was agreed but never happened.

The reason the assets were separated from the football company in 1992 was to protect them if the football company went bust - nothing more, nothing less. Holdings was a wholly owned subsidiary of the PLC (it had the same owners as the football company at all times). The PLC became Baton 2010 and Roland sold the football company out of it in 2020.

Err the football company wasn’t Roland’s to sell in 2020? That was Sandgaard buying from ESI 1 despite the injunction by ESI 2?

Err you need to check your facts. The football company was sold by Roland to ESI in January 2020.

This is also why the 15 year lease ran until a date in January 2035. You are confusing the publicity with the transaction.

ShootersHillGuru said:

I’ll get my tin hat ready but although I’d be very happy to see the football club and both The Valley and Sparrows re united in ownership I really don’t see the current state of affairs necessarily as a major obstacle to success on the pitch going forward. I accept that owning the real estate might provide some leverage in terms of dealing with banks should a loan be required but surely (?) that type of financial arrangement would be solely for capital investment. Not something I’d expect our owners to be looking at for the obvious reason of not owning the site and not needing at this point if ever of increasing the capacity. Sensible ownership, incremental improvements, good appointments with steady if unspectacular investment and not forgetting luck should imho see the football clubs on field achievements improve. I don’t believe the ownership of the real estate and footballing success are as closely linked as some. 

Airman Brown said:

ShootersHillGuru said:

I’ll get my tin hat ready but although I’d be very happy to see the football club and both The Valley and Sparrows re united in ownership I really don’t see the current state of affairs necessarily as a major obstacle to success on the pitch going forward. I accept that owning the real estate might provide some leverage in terms of dealing with banks should a loan be required but surely (?) that type of financial arrangement would be solely for capital investment. Not something I’d expect our owners to be looking at for the obvious reason of not owning the site and not needing at this point if ever of increasing the capacity. Sensible ownership, incremental improvements, good appointments with steady if unspectacular investment and not forgetting luck should imho see the football clubs on field achievements improve. I don’t believe the ownership of the real estate and footballing success are as closely linked as some. 

You should ask yourself why extending the lease back to its original length was a priority then. Investing in the football side, like investing in the ground, is compromised to a greater or lesser extent by the lack of certainty about the security of the status quo. 

I can’t speak to the motives of the owners, but they are bound to consider their investment in the light of its durability and risk. It is surprising they bought the club with a 11-12-year lease and it would be even more surprising if they were able to sell it on with a shorter one. It’s not about securing loans. It’s about the ability of a third party to wreck your business at will.

ShootersHillGuru said:

Airman Brown said:

ShootersHillGuru said:

I’ll get my tin hat ready but although I’d be very happy to see the football club and both The Valley and Sparrows re united in ownership I really don’t see the current state of affairs necessarily as a major obstacle to success on the pitch going forward. I accept that owning the real estate might provide some leverage in terms of dealing with banks should a loan be required but surely (?) that type of financial arrangement would be solely for capital investment. Not something I’d expect our owners to be looking at for the obvious reason of not owning the site and not needing at this point if ever of increasing the capacity. Sensible ownership, incremental improvements, good appointments with steady if unspectacular investment and not forgetting luck should imho see the football clubs on field achievements improve. I don’t believe the ownership of the real estate and footballing success are as closely linked as some. 

You should ask yourself why extending the lease back to its original length was a priority then. Investing in the football side, like investing in the ground, is compromised to a greater or lesser extent by the lack of certainty about the security of the status quo. 

I can’t speak to the motives of the owners, but they are bound to consider their investment in the light of its durability and risk. It is surprising they bought the club with a 11-12-year lease and it would be even more surprising if they were able to sell it on with a shorter one. It’s not about securing loans. It’s about the ability of a third party to wreck your business at will.

As I’d expect all very good and valid points but isn’t sitting behind the split ownership the prospect that The Valley will only ever be a football stadium for the reasons we already know regarding other development possibilities. On that basis unless the owner wants to increase the terms of the lease to a point where it’s not affordable to remain I don’t see it as an issue because if the football club were forced out for economic reasons the owner gets nothing in terms of revenue and is forced to go down the road of seeking planning permission with all the obstacles that entails which could take years ? With no certainty of success.