Housing market woe takes its toll on Grainger

The NAV fall to 535p a share was driven by an 8% fall in the vacant possession value of our properties and an increase in the discount applied to those values to calculate market values.

Underlying pretax profits, which strip out the effect of the revaluation, halved to £12m as a result of increased finance costs. The dividend has been maintained at last year’s level of 6.18p a share.

Chairman Robin Broadhurst said the company’s strategy in the short-to-medium term was maximising cashflow and remaining compliant with banking covenants.

‘The coming year will present many challenges and in response we will continue to operate as we have through the latter part of 2008 - maximising sales revenue, reducing property spend and cutting back on overhead,’ he said.

‘We are under no illusions as to how difficult these tasks will be but are confident that the irreplaceable and diverse nature of our core portfolio, the range of activity and expertise within the business and our experience of managing the business through previous downturns will stand us in good stead.’