Tag: Caja Laboral

Half Of Cruzcampo’s Former Site In Sevilla Goes Up For Sale

13 June 2016 – Andalucía Información

Investors and governments alike are trying to take advantage of the improvement in the economic environment to reactivate the real estate market in Sevilla. Whilst on Thursday, the Town Planning department put 19 plots of land in Sevilla, on which 1,440 homes may be built, up for forced sale through public auction, now comes the mandate for the confidential sale of half of the urban development rights over the large site of the former Cruzcampo factory, where the PGOU has authorised the construction of 1,963 homes, in addition to tertiary uses.

The site of the historical brewery on Avenida de Andalucía had gone from being a star project to a failing project. The Basque real estate company Urvasco, which acquired the plot during the golden years of the real estate boom, commissioned the design of a “high standing” neighbourhood to four of the star-architects at the time: Norman Foster, Jean Nouvel, Arata Isozaki and Guillermo Vázquez Consuegra, who…even had their photo taken together with Monteserín, the then mayor, on the balcony of the Town Hall, in 2006. At the time, sourcecs spoke about an investment of €750 million in the construction of a luxury neighbourhood that was going to boast a high category hotel with around 150 rooms.

Nevertheless, with the burst of the (real estate) bubble just two years later, the project ended up foundering, along with its developer, Urvasco, which was unable to meet its obligations with the banks that had lent it €330 million and so it had to hand over the land to a pool of financial entities and companies linked to them (around a dozen in total).

The ‘Compañía para los Desarrollos Inmobiliarios de la Ciudad de Híspalis’ is the owner of half of the urban development rights of this land (49.91% to be exact). The Company was constituted by Banco Popular, CajaSur, Caja Granada, Caja España, Caixa Catalunya, Cajastur, Caja Laboral, Bancaja and Caja de Ahorros de Extremadura.

This company, which had accumulated debt amounting to €294 million and losses of €200 million, filed for voluntary bankruptcy in January 2016 in the Commercial Court of Madrid, and its application was approved on 22 February. However, that has not represented an obstacle to the process to sell its urban development rights, entrusted to an intermediary company, which is looking for potential investors in a restricted process that will run until Friday (17 June), the deadline for the acceptance of offers.

The sales brochure highlights that the plot has a surface area of 18,286 sqm and is located just 400m from El Corte Inglés on Nervión Plaza (presented as the main shopping centre in Sevilla), as well as from Sevilla F.C.’s stadium and the Santa Justa train station.

The Interior Reform Plan definitively approved the development of 1,963 homes, of which 890 will be allocated for social housing, as part of a total constructible area for residential use of 225,823 sqm, as well as a further 29,345 sqm for tertiary use. Therefore, the gross buildable area amounts to 255,168 sqm.

All of this will be constructed on wide blocks located in the Southern area of the plot. The Northern section will be a green area covering more than 70,000 sqm. According to the sales brochure, “the proposed plans seeks to achieve a maximum liberation of space, of around 35% in total, for the enjoyment of citizens. To achieve this, the plans propose the construction of tall buildings, which in the case of the residential units will be 15-storeys high”.

Original story: Andalucía Información (by M. J. Florencino)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Solvia: The 2 “Castillas” Are The Black Sheep Of The RE Recovery

24 September 2015 – El Confidencial

Spain’s real estate market is very heterogeneous. There is nothing new about that. Madrid, Barcelona, the Costa del Sol and the (Balearic and Canary) Islands have all been showing signs of recovery for several months now, in terms of prices and the launch of new property developments.

Nevertheless, there are other areas where the desired recovery is not happening yet and other still where it is not even expected to happen, at least in the short term. The two Castillas (Castilla-La Mancha and Castilla y León) are two of these regions. The key drivers of the recovery have not been seen there yet and prices continue to be subject to downwards pressure. Or at least, those are the findings of ‘Solvia Market View‘, the first report about the real estate market prepared by Banco Sabadell’s servicer.

“Castilla-La Mancha is a market that is not showing any signs of recovery yet, since it has a large stock and a significant number of assets for sale, which are continuing to drive prices down. A slight increase in prices is only being observed in the historical centres of certain provincial capitals, such as Toledo and Cuenca, mainly due to the shortage of supply in these locations..but that is it”, explains Javier García del Río, CEO of Solvia.

Castilla y León finds itself in a very similar situation. The first timid signs of recovery are only being seen in a handful of towns and cities, where there is a shortage of supply and demand has been withheld – buyers have been waiting for prices to bottom out or have not been able to obtain financing until now. (…). According to García del Río, the drivers of the recovery are weak in these areas (Valladolid and Salamanca) and the demographic make-up does not help the recovery in demand, therefore the volume of activity is still very limited. (…).

High expectations in the País Vasco

Despite the sluggish behaviour in the two Castillas, Solvia has identified a certain degree of expectation in other parts of the peninsula, such as in the País Vasco. In Guipúzcao, for example, constructors are starting to build small developments, although the market is still quite slow there. Meanwhile, in Vizcaya, prices are stabilising for both new and second hand homes, and sales volumes are flat, according to Solvia. However, it points out that no new developments are being started there yet, unlike in Madrid for example. (…).

The stock of homes to be absorbed in Álava is still plentiful. “The financial entities (Kutxa, Caja Laboral) are starting some new property developments, which will be sold at a reasonable rate if they are marketed at competitive prices and are supported by financing”, says Javier García del Río. Meanwhile, in La Rioja, the market is normalising, especially in the north of the region, since as well as primary residences, it also supplies second homes for people from the País Vasco.

Sales have increased in Logroño, with competitive prices and a normalisation in terms of financing, although there is still a sizeable stock of new homes there. Finally, Navarra is a market that is still relatively inactive, with few operations overall; meanwhile, there has been a significant reduction in stock in Aragón and several property developments are being started at competitive prices. (…).

Finally, in Galicia and the northwest of Spain, particularly in A Coruña, there is a limited supply and reasonable demand for homes at affordable prices. In Vigo, there has not been a real estate boom, due to the suspension of the general (housing) plan during the crisis, but there is demand for finished products, whilst in Gijón, there is demand for homes in central, well-located areas.

Original story: El Confidencial (by E. Sanz)

Translation: Carmel Drake