Like any provincial city in the United Kingdom( UK), Birmingham will always be compared to the capital, London, and, as its retail, lifestyle, leisure and residential offerings continue to improve and employment prospects became better and broader, those comparisons have become more favourable.
With first-class entertainment venues attracting international artists and sporting events, and the ICC attracting major political party and business conferences, Birmingham has become a place to visit. Visitors have liked what they have found and returned, and hotels have multiplied to keep up with this demand.
New Street Station, though, continued to provide a poor first impression of the city to visitors. This changed last year with the re-launch of the station as a major 21st century facility, complete with its adjacent shopping and restaurant complex, Grand Central. Newly-launched city centre trams now travel past its front doors, improving connectivity across the city.
Much of the key infrastructure is now in place, and there is the potential of the HS2 link between Birmingham and London and then onwards to the North of England. Future growth is likely to attract inward investors, students and visitors to a vibrant and attractive multi-cultural city with a young and skilled population.
Brexit and the digital revolution mean change is ahead for Birmingham’ s economy
Like the rest of the UK, for the Birmingham economy, Brexit is a challenge, the size and scale of which is yet unknown. We were promised a vote to leave would hit the economy hard, only to see benign trading conditions quickly re-emerge. Indeed, the IMF recently upgraded its UK GDP forecast for 2016 to 1.8 % ‒ the strongest rate of growth the IMF is predicting for a G7 nation.
Being in the European Union( EU) may add 50 or 100 bps to the annual GDP percentage growth rate, but it is far from being the sole driver for the UK economy. As a G7 country, with a population of 65 million people, firms like Coca Cola and BMW will always want to sell to the UK consumer market.
Birmingham City Council’ s‘ Big City Plan’ is delivering some striking infrastructure improvements to help open up the centre of the city, allowing its vibrancy to spread to other areas which have traditionally struggled with being separated by a‘ concrete collar’ of roads. Within the plan, there is room for residential development in the centre of the city, an area of Birmingham which saw very little activity in terms of residential development in the years after the financial crisis.
JUNE 2017 SA Real Estate Investor 47