In the wake of recent global developments, we wanted to let you know how Bricklane is responding to the impact of the coronavirus (Covid-19) in each of the following areas:

While the next few months will potentially be highly disruptive for many industries, we have taken measures to ensure that Bricklane can continue to operate at full strength during this period. Over the past few days, we have been trialling remote working across all functions, and our entire team is now fully equipped to work away from our head office — ensuring there will be no disruption to our service. Our customer support team will continue to operate as normal.

We have also contacted many of our key suppliers who have confirmed they will be able to continue to support the smooth operation of our funds and properties.

Touchstone, our property management partners, are set up for remote working, and are maintaining regular contact with tenants, ensuring that tenant services will not be adversely affected. 

We always endeavour to help tenants to work through rental arrears in the event of earnings disruption, and will continue to do so with any tenants impacted by the coronavirus.

While past performance is not a reliable indicator of future returns, historically, property tends to have a less volatile returns profile than some other asset classes such as equities, which can have dramatic peaks and troughs in reaction to global events.

There are now 136 Bricklane properties spread across two portfolios (127 in the Regional Capitals Fund and 9 in the London Fund), meaning each individual property only accounts for a small percentage of rental income. This means risk is diversified across multiple properties, areas and tenants, ensuring that investment performance should not be significantly impacted if an individual tenant were to experience issues.

To maximise the potential of your investments, it is recommended you invest for the long term so that your investments can offset any fees and have time to grow. Our suggested hold period, found in the funds’ Key Investor Documents, is 5 years.

Your investment may go down, as well as up. Although the shares are listed, if you want to sell them, there is no guarantee that you will find a buyer within a timeframe, or at a price, acceptable to you. Investment is through shares in REITs. The REIT invests in real assets, which may take a long time to sell. Bricklane Investment Services Ltd is an appointed representative of Gallium Fund Solutions Limited, which is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority, FRN: 487176. Bricklane Investment Services Ltd is registered in England and Wales, No. 10021399, with a registered office at Floor 3, 26 Finsbury Square, London EC2A 1DS.