Torre Espacio’s Suitors Must Submit Bids Before 21 Oct

16 October 2015 – Expansión

The group has invited interested investors, insurance companies and funds to submit their bids by next week.

Grupo Villar Mir is pushing ahead with the process to sell its Madrilenian skyscraper Torre Espacio. The company, led by Juan Miguel Villar Mir, put the office building located in the Cuatro Torres complex, on the Paseo de la Castellana in Madrid, up for sale in June this year.

Villar Mir, which owns the property through his subsidiary Espacio, wanted to sell the building before the end of the summer, but decided to delay the sale after failing to receive any convincing offers. Pontegadea, the real estate company owned by Amancio Ortega, and Corporación Financiera Alba, controlled by the March family, expressed their interest in the building, for which Villar Mir is hoping to receive around €600 million.

After failing to receive any firm proposal, Espacio and the property consultant Aguirre Newman, responsible for the sale, decided to invite a wider range of investors to participate in the process.

Interested parties must submit their bids before 21 October, when the owner will begin to analyse the offers. According to real estate sources, there is a lot of interest in the market for the property, for which Villar Mir may receive between €500 million and €600 million. Potential buyers include institutional investment funds, such as Invesco, and insurance companies such as Axa and the March family.

Torre Espacio was inaugurated in 2007 after the Villar Mir group invested €400 million constructing it. The skyscraper contains office space with a surface area of 60,140 m2, 85% of which is occupied by tenants belonging to the Villar Mir group itself; the Dutch, Canadian, Australian and British embassies are also tenants of the property.

Original story: Expansión (by Rocío Ruiz)

Translation: Carmel Drake