A native of Sheffield, Kevin McCabe set up in 1980 a property company called Scarborough Holdings and formed a £50m joint venture between United and Scarborough Holdings to invest in low-risk commercial property. United Scarborough (a £50m property joint-venture with McCabe’s Scarborough property vehicle) sold two properties for a £1.6 million profit, of which £800,000 will swelled the current year profit and loss.
McCabe and his family still own the Scarborough group which has branched out into the Far East and China and which currently has a portfolio of property of over £500m in the UK alone. The group owns Forsyth plc, a serviced office subsidiary which runs the Blades Enterprise Centre and also a 20% stake in both Frasers Property (UK) Ltd and FairBriar Holdings Ltd.
He is the chairman of FairBriar plc, a listed residential development company in both London and the home counties and was chairman of Scamp Holdings Ltd. Scamp Holdings owns 72.3% of Teesland plc. He also sits on the board of certain subsidiary companies of Bank of Scotland.
On 27 June 2007, McCabe made £850 million by selling his entire 60 per cent stake of Scamp Holdings Ltd, a former subsidiary company of his Scarborough group to the Australian company, Valad. As part of the deal McCabe has invested Aus$100m in Valad and has been awarded a place on the boardroom. The remaining 40% of Scamp Holdings Ltd is still owned by Sheffield United plc.
According to the Yorkshire “Rich List”, McCabe has amassed a fortune of about £100 million from his worldwide property empire. With the sale of Scamp, this estimate has since been proved to be incorrect.
