UK commercial property values fall in March - CBRE

LONDON, April 9 (Reuters) - British commercial property values fell 1.2 percent in March, taking the market's total loss since last summer's bull market peak to around 16 percent, CB Richard Ellis Group Inc (CBG.N: Quote, Profile, Research) said on Wednesday.

The global property services firm said its data provided evidence that the market correction was slowing, with capital values down 4.5 percent in the first quarter compared with a drop of more than 10 percent in the final three months of 2007.

Total returns, which combine rental income and capital growth, were minus 0.7 percent in March compared with minus 0.9 percent in February.

CB Richard Ellis is the biggest contributor to industry-wide monthly data from Investment Property Databank, which are used as the basis for property index derivatives trading and are next due for publication on Thursday.

Based on property derivatives prices, commercial property values in the UK have a further 11-12 percent to fall in the remaining nine months of 2008. Some property analysts and fund managers are less pessimistic and expect the market to bottom before then. (Reporting by William Kemble-Diaz, editing by Gerald E. McCormick) (See www.reutersrealestate.com for the global service for real estate professionals from Reuters).