ONE of Britain’s wealthiest Asian businessmen, Shaid Luqman, will make almost £200m from the sale of the property-finance company he founded only six years ago.

Luqman, 37, has agreed to sell Lexi Holdings, which arranges short-term loans to property buyers, to a Middle Eastern banking family.

He and his relatives own Lexi outright and will be the sole beneficiaries of the sale.

Under the terms of the deal, which is expected to be announced in the next few weeks, Luqman, a former Entrepreneur of the Year, will sell Lexi for £195m but has agreed to stay as a consultant for the next three years.

He will be paid £3.5m a year for his services but will probably work part-time to concentrate on his other business interests. The identity of the family buying Lexi remains unknown but they are said to have been in the banking industry for decades. They are expected to provide about £750m, in addition to the purchase price, to help grow Lexi. The new owners are likely to rename the business.

Lexi has already expanded into Europe and the Middle East, with Britain accounting for about 20% of its business. It has more than 60% of the bridging-loan market and makes profits of £21.4m on sales of £36m.

Luqman, who declined to comment, got the idea for Lexi while he was building up his property portfolio in Manchester and London in the 1990s. He found that the short-term loans he often needed for his deals frequently took too long to arrange.

The business was launched when Luqman managed to secure £2.5m in funding from the financial-markets team at Barclays and it rapidly took off.

Luqman started in business when he was a student by buying his own house and proceeded to develop a portfolio of 24 properties.

He was named Entrepreneur of the Year in 2004, and enjoys the fruits of success, including a Gulfstream jet.

According to the Sunday Times Rich List, he is worth £145m, but that figure is certain to rise when this year’s list is published later this month.

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