Property firm's ambitious plans to repopulate Falkirk town centre roll on

The REWD – Real Estate Wealth Development – Group, run by local entrepreneurs Laurie Duncan and Alex Robertson, had already secured the massive property above Poundstretchers at 150 to 156 High Street and now they have added the premises above 18 High Street and 8 Lint Riggs.

Their long term aim is to keep retail on the ground floor and create flats on the first floor in an attempt to help drive up the footfall in the town centre.

Laurie said: “We now own Cash Converters’ building in High Street and the space above Greggs going round into Lint Riggs – it’s an L-shaped unit and we would hope to get a minimum four flats out of it, but we will see what the architects say.”

REWD Group is planning to invest £1.5 million in the 2500 square metres development above Poundstretchers – which will see 16 flats being created – and is hopeful it will get the go ahead from Falkirk Council planners at the start of October.

The group’s plans to convert the former Indian restaurant in La Porte Precinct, Grangemouth was given the go ahead by the council earlier this year.

“We are starting to rip out the restaurant and the refurbishment will start in October,” said Laurie.

REWD Group is looking for more properties to develop and include in their plan to have ground floor businesses and first floor residences.

Laurie said: “We are trying to find more opportunities. We were due to buy another town centre property but the sellers changed their minds unfortunately.”

Since it began operating two years ago, REWD Group has seen its combined property investment portfolio grow to a multi-million pound valuation.The overall aim of REWD Group is to create wealth for its investors by addressing the significant supply and demand imbalance in the UK property market – and this could have the welcome knock on effect of regenerating struggling town centres at the same time.According to REWD, the UK housing market has reached a critical level of under supply, with a shortage of homes compared to current demand.At the same time many high streets are sadly becoming “ghost towns”, with large retailers going out of business or downsizing their number of stores.Many of these empty properties create a great opportunity to aid the residential housing under supply.Laurie said: “We have a good track record in residential buying and letting. Now we are looking to move into bigger projects and would like to try and develop properties in Falkirk and Grangemouth town centres.“Our focus is now on developing empty commercial premises and turning them into residential properties. Our focus is on Falkirk and Grangemouth areas, as we’re both local guys.“The way we look at it is, how are you going to get people back into the High Street? Well we do it by actually having people live in the town centre.”

Visit www.facebook.com/rewdgroup or www.rewdgroup.co.uk for more information.