One of the country’s largest property management companies, Glasgow-based Speirs Gumley is to expand its operations by opening an office in Edinburgh at the end of this month.

The firm, with a heritage of 180 years of experience in this sector, currently manages 27,000 commercial and residential units in 750 different developments across the Central Belt, Ayrshire and Lanarkshire.

Surging demand for its services in residential and commercial property management, as well as residential letting, has delivered strong growth and increased profits by 30 per cent over the last two years

Re-investing the money in IT and increasing staffing levels from 64 to 70, the company is establishing a presence in the capital with a new office at Davidsons Mains, which will create an initial five new jobs and deliver a new training facility.

Speirs Gumley has also built up a strong reputation for successfully managing historic and iconic buildings, including The Beresford on Sauchiehall Street, the listed Wellpark Enterprise Centre owned by Glasgow Building Preservation Trust, and the Merchant Building commercial offices in George Square.

Residential clients include Stewart Milne and Bellway.

Lorraine MacDonald, senior partner, said: "Our Glasgow office is busier than ever, with confidence returning to the property sector, and we really believe this is the right time for the company to expand.

"We already have 1400 properties on our books across the capital and expect to grow this to 2000 within 12 months.

"Having a physical presence there will allow us to build significantly on our offerings and we are excited about the potential in the city."

Senior managers will also work regularly from the new Quality Street premises, which will also be home to a training hub, delivering induction programmes and company wide development.

"The firm has a long history dating back to 1827, when it handled factoring for the tobacco landlords, and, while we are innovative in the way we tackle things, we still have a lot of real traditional values," she said.

"We recently introduced a client gateway system to allow people to access their accounts online, but we also appreciate that this is not for everyone."

A troubleshooter by nature, MacDonald insists her job is not rocket science, just high standards, a bit of common sense, and good communication. She does, however, tell a salutary tale of why practical hands-on management can sometimes be very important.

"I press the emergency bell in every lift I go into if we are considering managing a building, just to test it out. In one case, absolutely nothing happened. There wasn’t even a dialling tone.

"It turned out the telephone line had been cut off when the bill had not been paid. You could say the owners were quite shocked."

In brief

Lanarkshire based fit-out experts GHI Contracts are on target for a projected turnover of £32m, the biggest in the firm’s 22-year history.

The news follows success in winning more than £15m of business since the start of 2016. The work includes a £2.5m project refurbishing Tay House over the M8 motorway near Charing Cross, £1.1m update of 100 Bothwell Street, Glasgow for the Student Loans Company, and £2.6m improvement for a global online retailer in Waverley Gate, Edinburgh city centre.

The sectors range from retail, where the firm is handling £1.3m refurbishment of shop units in St Nicholas Street, Aberdeen, to business parks, where it is handling a £5m fit-out for a major financial institution. Office work includes interiors for tech firm Lenovo at Braehead and a £800k improvement for international shipping company Teekay in Glasgow’s Elliot Street.

To cope with the workload, GHI have taken on two new project managers at their Bellshill base, promoted another, and started four more staff around the country.

Managing director Gordon Cairns remains modest about the firm’s success: "We know what we are good at and what we have a reputation for, and we have concentrated on quality of growth rather than quantity."

Edinburgh-based entrepreneur Shaf Rasul is claiming success after piloting a new web-based property marketing approach.

His firm SRA Ventures is breaking the conventional mould by exploiting new channels to promote a currently vacant property in the capital’s Sighthill area. The breaking-news style YouTube trailer is being used to showcase availability of an 8500 sq ft recently refurbished property at Bankhead Crossway North.

Working with property agents Graham + Sibbald in their first venture into virtual/digital marketing, the company has filmed and developed video content which is gaining momentum through property agents sharing it online.