3 October 2019 – The French real estate investment fund Corum has acquired a 5,890-m2 commercial warehouse from the Wala sporting goods distribution chain. The sale and leaseback operation comes with an implicit return of around 6%.
The warehouse, where Wala has been operating since 2011, is located at the southern end of Tarragona, around the Francolí and Entrevías industrial estates.
Original Story: Eje Prime – M. C. P.
Adaptation/Translation: Richard D. K. Turner
22 January 2019 – Expansión
The French hotel chain B&B Hotels – owned by the fund PAI Partners – has sold a hotel in Viladecans (Barcelona) to the French fund Corum for €6.6 million. It is the chain’s largest hotel in Spain, with 216 rooms.
This operation follows the sale of eight hotels that the company completed last year, also to Corum. Like it did then, B&B is going to continue operating the latest asset under a rental arrangement for at least 15 years. Following the sale, B&B owns just two hotels in Spain, in Oviedo and Barcelona (…).
B&B now operates 30 establishments in Spain and plans to continue growing its portfolio in the country during 2019. Its hotels in the country are owned by funds, Socimis and family offices, such as Corum, Atom, Covivo, Doalca and Azata.
Original story: Expansión (by R.A.)
Translation: Carmel Drake
11 June 2018 – Expansión
The Baraka Group, controlled by the businessman Trinitario Casanova, has closed an agreement to sell one of the logistics assets owned by its construction company Trabis.
Specifically, Baraka has sold a logistics warehouse, called Trabis II, located in the Murcian town of Yecla, the region where Casanova’s companies are headquartered. The property, which has a constructed surface area of 14,000 m2, has been sold for €14 million through a sale and leaseback contract.
“The advantage is that the buyer is guaranteed an asset in which the tenant will continue to undertake its activity”, explained Pablo Carvajal, Director of Capital Markets at Catella, the consultancy firm that has advised the new owner in the transaction.
The buyer is the French fund manager Corum Asset Management. Created in 2011 and with offices in Paris and Amsterdam, the firm set itself the objective last year of investing €500 million in real estate assets across Europe, with a special focus on Spain. For its investments, whose yields exceed 6%, Corum works with two funds Corum Origin and Corum XL, the latter was launched last year.
This is not the first time that Baraka and Corum have closed an operation together. In July 2016, the French firm paid more than €24.8 million for another logistics building also leased to Trabis.
Corum is one of the international investors that has opted to purchase logistics assets in Spain, a booming market due to its high returns and the increase in the e-commerce business. “The logistics investment market is proving attractive for domestic and international investors alike and increasingly more are investing in this type of asset. Between January and May, €250 million has been invested in these types of properties”, say sources at Catella.
At the overall level, investment during the first half of the year is expected to reach €5 billion. “During 2018, €3 billion has been invested in tertiary (non-residential) assets. Taking into account certain transactions pending completion, we expect to see investment of close to €5 billion during the first half of the year, around €1 billion less than during the same period in 2017”, he predicts.
Casanova
The divestment of this logistics warehouse comes just weeks after Trinitario Casanova entered the Madrid Nuevo Norte real estate project (known as Operación Chamartín). The businessman has committed to pay €400 million to the initial owners for the rights to 1.2 million m2 of land (now in the hands of the Ministry of Development) where the company DCN, controlled by BBVA and SanJosé, is planning to build an urban development with more than 10,500 homes.
In addition, Casanova is working on the marketing of the future shopping arcade in Edificio España, the property that he purchased from Wanda for €172 million to immediately sell it on to the RIU hotel group.
Original story: Expansión (by Rocío Ruiz)
Translation: Carmel Drake
5 February 2018 – Expansión
Growth / The French group has added seven establishments from the H2 Hoteles chain, two under ownership. Its domestic portfolio now comprises 29 hotels and more than 2,700 rooms.
B&B Hotels –owned by the private equity fund PAI Partners – is strengthening its commitment to Spain. The French group, which arrived in the country in 2015 with the purchase of four hotels and, one year later, purchased the low-cost chain Sidorme, has incorporated seven new establishments from the Catalan H2 Hoteles chain into its portfolio. Two of the properties have been included as owned assets and the other five are rental arrangements; these hotels contain 600 rooms in total.
With this operation, the company specialising in low-cost hotels now operates 29 establishments in the domestic market, comprising more than 2,700 rooms.
Specifically, B&B Hotels has completed the purchase of the management company and the rental contracts – which have a duration of almost 20 years – and has incorporated the H2 Hoteles establishments’ teams in Castellón, Elche, Getafe, Granada and Jerez de la Frontera, owned by AC Hoteles. Moreover, the French group has taken ownership of another two hotels in Oviedo and Rubí (Barcelona).
Following the purchase, H2 Hoteles will have three hotels left in its portfolio –H2 Sant Cugat (Barcelona), H2 Fuenlabrada (Madrid) and H2 Ávila–, as well as apartments in Cáceres.
The Director General of B&B Hotels Spain and Portugal, Jairo González, explained to Expansión that the company plans to sell the ownership assets in the short term. “We will likely incorporate other hotels to be able to have a portfolio of assets that we can sell all together, continuing with their management and following the company’s asset-light model”, he said.
In the framework of this strategy, in May, B&B Hotels reached an agreement with the investment fund Corum to sell eight hotels that it owned in Spain for €30 million. By virtue of that agreement, B&B will continue to operate those establishments under rental agreements for at least 15 years.
The director said that the H2 Hoteles establishments are “in perfect operating condition”, and will be adapted over the next few months to fit with the company’s corporate image.
“The forecast investment for the seven hotels amounts to almost €1.5 million and will be limited to adapting the establishments to our identity”, he added.
Plans
In terms of growth plans, the executive expressed his intention to continue to increase his firm’s presence in Spain. “We have more than 20 projects under development in different degrees of maturity in the Iberian Peninsula. In Portugal, for example, we expect to announce more news soon. We forecast that we will have more than 50 establishments by the end of 2019”, said González.
B&B’s roadmap in Spain allowed the firm to triple its revenues last year to reach €30 million. Besides Spain, B&B Hotels Group has a presence in France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Morocco, the Czech Republic and Brazil. The company’s plans involve strengthening its world network to reach 600 hotels by 2020, with around 50,000 rooms.
Original story: Expansión (by Rebeca Arroyo)
Translation: Carmel Drake
19 May 2017 – Expansión
The hotel chain B&B Hotels and the investment fund Corum have reached an agreement to allow the former to divest the assets that it owns in Spain, whilst continuing to manage them, and the latter to strengthen its presence in the country with the purchase of eight hotels.
According to the terms of the agreement, B&B will sell the establishments to Corum for €30 million, although it will continue to operate them under a lease arrangement for at least 15 years. The hotels included in this operation are located in Figueres, Girona, Granollers, Mollet, Viladecans, Valencia, Albacete and Fuenlabrada.
The two groups also plan to explore new opportunities to collaborate in Spain and Portugal during 2017.
B&B Hotels, owned by the fund PAI Partners, operates 20 hotels in Spain after it purchased the low-cost chain Sidorme last October. The French hotel group, which tripled its turnover in Spain in 2016, to exceed €20 million, wants to double in size in the country within three years and is evaluating its expansion into Portugal.
Meanwhile, the real estate investment fund Corum, which manages more than €1,300 million in assets across Europe, is planning to invest more than €450 million in various European countries, including Spain, in 2017.
Corum made its debut in Spain in 2013 with the purchase of a commercial property in Tarragona. This is the sixth operation that the fund has completed in the country.
For Jairo González, CEO of B&B Hotels in Spain and Portugal, this operation allows the chain to “lighten the load” on its balance sheet in Spain to be able to incorporate more hotels into its network.
Philippe Cervesi, Director of Investment at Corum, said that the agreement reflects Corum’s capacity to find “interesting assets, with a good return and excellent guarantees, in an attractive market such as Spain”.
Original story: Expansión (by Rebeca Arroyo)
Translation: Carmel Drake
8 March 2017 – Expansión
The real estate fund manager Corum Asset Management has placed its focus on Spain. The firm, created in 2011 and with offices in Paris and Amsterdam, has closed 2016 with a record investment figure of €328 million.
In the case of Spain, the manager chose the market to carry out its first operation outside of France, acquiring its first asset in 2013: a retail property in Tarragona, which is leased to MediaMarkt.
Three years later, in May last year, Corum sold that asset to a fund managed by Ciloger for €9.43 million. “2016 was a record year in terms of transactions, with a deal volume amounting to €360 million, of which €328 million involved acquisitions. In addition, we made our first sale in an overseas market in 2016, in this case in Spain, where we achieved a significant return”, explained Philipp Cervesa, Head of Investments at Corum AM.
Besides that sale, the French manager closed three purchases amounting to €41.4 million in Spain, involving logistics assets, during the year. Specifically, in April, it acquired two platforms in Gerona and Guadalajara, with a combined surface area of 35,670 m2. Three months later, Corum AM paid more than €24.8 million for a logistics building leased to the company Trabis. “Our strategy is to bet on real estate cycles. We are investing in Spain because it offers good diversification and is a very dynamic market”, said Cervesi.
Both operations achieved a return of around 7.6%. “We invested heavily between 2013 and 2014, when the market fell, and thanks to that, we have undertaken some good deals, such as the sale of the property leased to MediaMarkt, which we sold last year for a hefty profit”. A high return that the manager forecasts it will maintain in 2017. “We are looking for assets with long-term lease contracts and high returns, of around 7%, he added.
This year, the manager, which invests directly through an Asset Management fund, has set itself the objective of increasing its portfolio to €500 million. “Our strategy for 2017 is to invest between €450 million and €500 million in the Eurozone. We have not set ourselves any country limits, which means that we could buy an unlimited amount in Spain”, explained the Head of the fund.
Original story: Expansión (by Rocío Ruiz)
Translation: Carmel Drake
Portugal 
Italy 
Greece 
