Social Infrastructure · Schools

What pays for a school estate — and how stable it is

A schools PFI (BSF-style) splits the asset from the education: the investor funds and maintains the school buildings and is paid a long, government-backed, inflation-linked unitary charge for availability and hard FM — paid whether or not every place is filled — while the local authority and schools run the teaching. On top sits the school services (catering, cleaning, caretaking, community lettings) that flex with how full the rolls are. The availability charge is the rock-solid core; pupils on roll add a services kicker. The case turns on the number of places, the charge, and occupancy.

9,000
£5,500
92%
LIVE
Classroom in use pupils in — services in use Available place funded whether filled or not School services catering, cleaning, caretaking Unitary charge paid at the entrance
Flows — annualised from current assumptionsper year
Revenue p.a.
£0
£0 / hr
EBITDA p.a.
£0
0% margin
Revenue / place
£0
unitary + services
Pupils on roll
0
92% occupancy
Stocks — what the flows accumulate intolive
Pupils on roll now
0
of 9,000 places
EBITDA banked · session
£0
accumulating in real time
Implied enterprise value
£0
at 16× EBITDA
Where revenue comes from Total £0 p.a.
Availability & hard FM
School services
Why investors like schools PFI: the unitary charge is a long (typically 25-year), sovereign-backed, inflation-linked annuity for the availability of the school buildings, paid by the local authority regardless of how many places are filled. That contracted core supports very high leverage and low, stable equity returns. The school-services layer (catering, cleaning, caretaking, out-of-hours lettings) flexes with the rolls, adding a modest kicker. The real risks are operational — availability and FM-performance deductions — not demand.
Revenue streams£0 p.a.
Operating costs£0 p.a.
Investment case — should you buy it?DCF returns

Year-1 financials flow live from the simulation above: revenue £0 and EBITDA £0 p.a. Set your deal terms below — the unlevered IRR (asset return) and levered IRR (return to equity, after debt) recompute instantly.

Operating

%
%
%
%
%
%

Valuation & hold

×
×
y

Financing

×
%
%
Unlevered IRR
—
asset / project return
Levered IRR
—
return to equity
Equity multiple
—
MOIC over hold
Equity gain
—
exit equity − invested
Equity cash-flow profile£m · ■ invested   ■ returned
Projection — £m per year

Illustrative model. Represents an availability-based schools PFI/PPP (BSF-style). Revenue = a contracted unitary charge for availability & hard FM (places × charge, paid regardless of occupancy) plus school services (catering, cleaning, caretaking) and community-lettings income that scale with the rolls. Operating costs (hard FM & lifecycle, catering & cleaning, energy & utilities, insurance & SPV, a management fee) are part fixed (per place) and part activity-driven — so the unitary annuity is a stable high-margin core while school-services revenue and cost flex together. Teaching and education services are provided separately by the schools/local authority and are not part of this model. EBITDA = revenue − operating costs; excludes upfront construction capex and senior debt service. The investment case is a simplified DCF. For illustration only — not investment advice, and not any specific asset.