Tag: British investors

Arum Group Invests Another €80M to Expand La Manga Club

20 November 2018 – Eje Prime

Arum Group is getting its wallet out to expand its resort in Murcia. The Spanish property developer, chaired by the magnate Jordi Robinat, is planning to invest more than €80 million in the upcoming expansion of La Manga Club, its residential complex located in the municipality of Cartagena, according to explanations provided by sources at the group speaking to Eje Prime.

The company is already processing a new partial plan to expand the resort by more than 48,000 m2, with the aim of developing new homes. Moreover, if the operation goes ahead, the group forecasts that the building work will begin between the end of next year and the beginning of 2020. The scheduled execution period is between three and four years.

Currently, La Manga Club has a surface area of 1.3 million m2, contains 2,300 homes, two 5- and 4-star hotels, three golf courses (one of which has 18 holes), thirty clay tennis courts, eight soccer fields and a cricket pitch.

With the majority of the residential assets now sold, Arum Group is developing the last one hundred homes, which will be primarily dedicated to international buyers. “English investors are the most common, although increasingly, we are closing more operations with Norwegian clients, as well as Belgians and people from other countries in the north of Europe”, explain sources at the company.

La Manga Club is the only project that the Arum Group has underway in the Region of Murcia. In fact, the property developer owned by Robinat purchased the complex from the Anglo-American cruise company, The Peninsular&Oriental Steam Navigation (P&O), in 2004 for €146 million.

Since then, the Spanish company, headquartered in Barcelona, has undertaken several expansions of the resort, which is one of the largest in southern Europe. The company owns three other residential projects currently underway in Spain, two in Cataluña and one in Tenerife.

The transformation of the Arum Group

The origins of the Arum Group date back to the 1990s, when Jordi Robinat, one of the people responsible for the launch and subsequent sale of the iconic Palace and Ritz hotels in Madrid, decided to set up on his own. He did so initially by creating the firm Med Resort before then formalising the expansion of the company in the Spanish real estate sector, under the brand Medgroup.

With that company, which at the time included George Soros and the former Goldman Sachs banker, Richard Perry, amongst its largest shareholders, Robinat introduced the tourist resort complex to the Spanish coast by integrating homes, hotels, golf courses, spa centres and commercial premises into the same complex.

Original story: Eje Prime (by Berta Seijo)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Madrid’s Offices Record Highest Occupancy Rates For 10 Years

29 November 2017 – Eje Prime

Offices are getting increasingly busier. In Madrid, the real estate sector is recording pre-crisis figures, with an occupancy (take-up) rate during the first nine months of the year of 359,000 m2, the highest volume for a decade.

This indicator is also encouraging the leasing of workspaces. According to a report from the consultancy firm Knight Frank, the Madrilenian office market is aspiring to close 2017 with half a million square metres of space leased, in large part, thanks to the 3.1% growth rate of Spain’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP). This data consolidates the Spanish capital as a point of reference for the sector across the country and makes it one of the fastest growing markets in Europe.

The volume of investment in this segment of the tertiary sector as at September 2017 was €928 million, with British and US investors increasing their activity by the most this year. That fact has caused the domestic quota to decrease from 80% to 65% in just twelve months.

The availability of office space in Madrid has decreased by 11.6% during the same period; the expectation is that over the next two years, the pipeline of stock will increase by 325,000 m2. Of that future space, 26% is already leased, most notably, the 36,000 m2 of space that the British company WPP acquired on Calle Ríos Rosas, where the former headquarters of Telefónica was located, and the 48,000 m2 of space that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is going to make use of at number 8 Plaza del Marqués de Salamanca.

In terms of the economics, the high demand in this market in the Spanish capital is resulting in an increase in prime rents in the city, with an upward trend that saw rental prices reach €29.50/m2 during the third quarter.

Original story: Eje Prime

Translation: Carmel Drake