• Transaction / Assets
    Grupo Resa
  • Seller
    Azora, Artá Capital, March Campus & Mutua Madrileña
  • Buyer
    AXA & CBRE GI
  • € MM

AXA & CBRE GI Buy Resa, The Student Hall Giant

19 September 2017 – El Confidencial

Azora, Artá Capital, March Campus (the investment vehicle backed by Banca March clients) and Mutua Madrileña have reached an agreement to sell 100% of Grupo Resa to a group of international investors. AXA IM – Real Assets and CBRE Global Investment Partners – on behalf of their clients – have acquired most of the portfolio, whilst Greyster, which has acquired the operating business, will act as the asset manager.

The operation is subject to final authorisation from the competition authorities and, although the amount of the transaction is unknown, real estate experts say that it will be one of the most important transactions in 2017 by investment volume.

Grupo Resa, which has been on the market since the beginning of March, has consolidated its position as the largest platform of student halls in Spain, with 9,309 beds in 19 cities, including Madrid, Barcelona and Salamanca. Resa is the largest student hall company in Spain, and in Continental Europe. Managed by Azora since 2011, it has experienced significant growth during that period, increasing its portfolio of halls from 26 to 37, of which 33 are currently operational and the remaining 4 are being constructed. BBVA and CBRE have acted as financial advisors to the vendors and Garrigues has been the legal advisor to the operation.

Resa obtained revenues of €46 million in 2016, which represented an increase of 30% with respect to the figure recorded in 2014 (€27 million), when it generated an EBITDA of €26 million. The occupancy ratio of the properties is close to 100%, according to documentation about the company (to which this newspaper has had access) and also according to its ambitious expansion plans for the next decade, which include doubling in size, to achieve a portfolio of around 17,000 beds across Spain.

Resa currently has four projects underway, which will add almost one thousand more beds to its existing supply, in such a way that, in the short term, it will have almost 10,000 beds. To put that in context, the company has seven times more beds than its next largest competitor in Spain (…).

The sale of Resa is the second operation of these characteristics to go ahead in Spain in a year, given that in March last year, the fund Oaktree put Threesixty Developments – formerly Knightsbridge Student Housing – up for sale. It is one of the largest builders and operators of student halls of residence in the United Kingdom, Ireland and Spain, where it has seven projects – five in Madrid and two in Barcelona – which it manages through the Student Housing Company platform and which contain more than 2,600 beds.

Twenty years of experience

(…). Grupo Resa was founded in 1992 and four years later it opened its first hall of residence in Terrasa. (…). Its stock includes accommodation with everything included to the rental of rooms only.

Original story: El Confidencial (by E.S.)

Translation: Carmel Drake