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TWST: Can we start with an introduction and quick historical sketch behind Savills (London: SVS.L)?

Mr. Adams: Savills plc is a company that was originally founded in 1865. It was quoted and became a listed Plc in 1988. At that stage, it was probably a second-level business in terms of the property service companies in the U.K., but since then its grown rapidly. Last year the total revenue was about 276 million pounds, with profits before tax of 21.6 million pounds, EPS of 24.2 pence, and it is now a business, certainly in the U.K., that’s ranked number one by a leading trade journal. We’re a very broad based business. We cover everything from residential to commercial and agricultural. The spread of the business is basically sixty percent in Europe, forty percent in Asia. We acquired a business in Asia three years ago, the FPD business and FPD Savills brand. So we're very much focused on Europe and Asia. We have a link-up in the States with Trammell Crow Company, a company that took a ten percent shareholding in us a couple of years ago. So we very much see ourselves as one of the leading players in the property service world and, together with Trammell Crow, we’re looking to be the leading player in the field.

TWST: Going forward, what will be Savills’ strategic direction over the next couple of years?

Mr. Adams: It's very much to build from the existing core of our business, which in essence is a property service business. That includes everything from brokerage through to professional services, property management and facilities management on a limited scale. We also have a principal trading arm which is unusual for a lot of property services companies. We don’t actually invest money in deals. We see that as something that’s going to become much more common in the future. Financial services – we have a residential mortgage broking business which is doing extremely well, and the question is how far we can build that into a rather larger business. So it’s moving ahead on the existing businesses and looking at areas where we can bolt in a new business where it clearly has a synergy with our existing businesses.

TWST: Is it currently a favorable environment in the U.K. for property investment?

Mr. Adams: It looks extremely good. We must be living in a different world from everyone else because at the moment trading is strong. Property looks very good. It certainly looks very good compared with the other markets. Whether that can go on for a long period of time is a question. Everybody feels that property, ultimately, is going to react to what is happening in the other markets, but at this stage it looks like a safe bet. People are going for property because it gives them yields; capital values are probably relatively safe at a time when the financial markets are up and down by five or ten percent in a week. I think property has been the best performing asset class, certainly for the last three years or probably longer.

TWST: What guidance are you giving to the investment community today?

Mr. Adams: What we will say is that generally in terms of the return you will get from commercial property probably Capital values may edge off a bit, with average yields of around about seven or eight percent. So you may be looking at total returns of nine percent. In terms of the residential markets, the mainstream market seems to have gone a little bit mad. You’re talking about eighteen percent returns this year, which is well above trend. But in the prime markets – and we very much focus on prime – you’re probably looking at returns of more like eight to ten percent and then dropping back next year but you’re still showing pretty healthy returns, which I think most people would actually be fairly happy with.