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Anticipa Evaluates Purchase Of Sareb’s Large RE Debt Portfolio

8 November 2016 – Expansión

The real estate manager Anticipa Real Estate, a subsidiary of the US fund Blackstone, has expressed its interest in acquiring a portfolio of 200 non-performing loans worth €1,000 million, which the bad bank Sareb put up for sale last month.

It is the largest real estate debt portfolio that the Spanish bad bank has put on the market in its three and a half years of life. Sareb hopes to sell the portfolio in its entirety to a single buyer, and it is expected to award it through a competitive process that will be completed at the end of 2016 or the beginning of 2017.

In an interview, the CEO of Anticipa, Eduard Mendiluce, said that the company has not yet submitted a binding offer for the portfolio, which was put up for sale just three weeks ago, but he confirmed that his firm intends to analyse the portfolio because it is very attractive.

Mendiluce commented that in the last twelve months, no large real estate portfolios have come onto the market, which he explained was due to the crisis in the financial sector, which “needs time to absorb the provisions required for foreclosed assets and non-performing loans before those assets can be sold”.

Anticipa, which has starred in some of the major operations undertaken in the sector in recent years, such as the purchase of a portfolio of non-performing mortgages from CatalunyaCaixa and the purchase of a portfolio containing property developer loans from Sareb, currently manages around €10,000 million in problem loans and owns a stock of 5,000 homes.

All of these properties have come into its possession as a result of “daciones en pago” – when the owner hands over the home to pay off his outstanding debt – and 70% of them are currently being leased out.

In fact, one of Anticipa’s objectives is to become a leading manager in the rental market in Spain.

In this sense, Mendiluce has called on the different governments to launch a “clear and convincing” aid program to support the rental market (in Spain) and place it at the level of other countries in Europe, where this way of accessing a home is much more widespread.

For example, the Director is proposing tax incentives for families who choose to rent, for renovations and for people who are unable to pay market prices.

“In short, a set of measures that incentivise private operators to back this market as an alternative for investing and managing a supply of competitive and high-quality homes”, he said.

Mendiluce added that as “large, stable and solid” companies emerge with a stock of high-quality and attractive homes for rent for families, so demand will consolidate in Spain, just like it has done in other European countries, such as Germany and United Kingdom, where several large, listed and unlisted, companies operate with thousands of rental properties on their balance sheets.

“In addition to the aspects of professionalisation of the sector and improvements in techniques and procedures, we need a dedicated aid program to support rental housing from the central, regional and local governments”, he said.

Anticipa is based in El Prat de Llobregat (Barcelona) and currently employs 303 people.

Original story: Expansión

Translation: Carmel Drake