West Ham’s new London Stadium rent deal revealed

West Ham has agreed to pay London Stadium owners E20 Stadium LLP another £250,000 per year to increase their capacity to 60,000 it has been revealed today.

The increase will take the Hammers rent to around £3.25m per year next year when index-linked and other current add-0ns are included with West Ham paying around £83 per year for each of the extra 3000 seats.

The Hammers will need to pay another £83,000 per year to take capacity to 62,5000 meaning the cost of each of the 2,500 seats drops to £33 per year and another £115,500 per year to reach the maximum capacity of 66,000 again costing the Hammers £33 per seat per year for the remaining 3,500 seats.

West Ham has also agreed to pick up any direct licensing, planning and physical improvement costs required to increase capacity at the London Stadium.  Those costs to increase capacity from 62,500 to 66,000 are thought to be as high as £10m in extra facilities costs.

The previously confidential agreement reached out of court in November has been revealed in a letter from West Ham United and E20 to the London Assembly.

Gareth Bacon AM, Chairman of the Budget & Performance Committee said: “We’re pleased that peace has broken out between the London Stadium’s key players. We saw first-hand how fractious the relationship had become between the London Legacy Development Corporation and West Ham – but we also sensed a way forward was still possible. Both parties want the London Stadium to succeed but both had become trapped in a toxic stalemate. It made no sense for the LLDC to squander more taxpayers’ money on legal costs to break the deadlock, especially when talks held in a spirit of goodwill could achieve the same result.

“In October we called on both parties to pull back from the brink and seize a common sense solution. We’re glad this amicable settlement quickly followed our intervention.”

The letter can be read HERE