ABSTRACT
This chapter shows how the growth of the multiple retailers during the inter-war years, together with the associated development of nationally-based property market intermediaries. The inter-war years saw profound changes in the character and pattern of commercial property development in Britain. The development of a financial climate in which commercial enterprises had considerable incentives to rent, rather than own, their business premises, or to dispose of some property rights to their premises in return for an immediate capital sum. Commercial estate agents often arranged funding for property investors and speculators, both via mortgages and leaseback arrangements with insurance companies. The growth of an efficient and integrated market, covering the geographical area in which the investments were situated. The growth of the multiples had been significant since the 1880s, but it was during the inter-war period that they came to dominate urban retailing.
