Tag: Joaquín Rivero

Lone Star Puts Isla Chamartín Business Park Up For Sale

2 February 2017 – El Economista

In just a few days time, Lone Star will hang the For Sale sign up on one of the most attractive office asset in its Madrid portfolio. The asset in question is the Isla Chamartín business park, located in the north of the capital, opposite the studios owned by the production company Zeppelin Televisión.

The complex, which comprises four office buildings with a surface area of more than 9,000 m2 each, is located on Avenida de Manoteras 20 and, according to comments from sources in the sector, will be put on the market for more than €110 million.

The US fund generated revenues of €380 million at the end of last year from the sale of the Adequa business park, which neighbours Isla Chamartín. That is a mixed use complex, covering more than 100,000 m2, which is now owned by the Socimi Merlin and which includes land on which two more buildings are going to be constructed.

The two complexes entered Lone Star’s portfolio in 2015, when the fund foreclosed a debt package amounting to more than €600 million from Bami Newco, the real estate company owned by the late Joaquín Rivero, which filed for liquidation that same year.

The Isla Chamartín complex was finished just a few months before the real estate bubble burst – its four buildings were inaugurated between February 2007 and June 2008.

In total, the properties that comprise the park have a combined surface area of 38,134 m2, plus 930 parking spaces. Their tenants include Iberdrola Ingeniería y Construcción, BBVA Consultoría and Aernnova Engineering Solutions Iberica.

Over the last few weeks, Lone Star has been organising the sales process to select the agents that will take care of the marketing side. In the end, the fund has engaged the consultancy firms Knight Frank and CBRE, which are expected to launch the official sales process at the beginning of February.

Experts believe that this asset, located just seven minutes by car from Madrid Barajas Adolfo Suárez airport, with two Metro stops and easy access to the M-11 and A-1, will be well received by investors. (…).

Original story: El Economista (by Alba Brualla)

Translation: Carmel Drake

What Has Become Of The Property Kings?

23 April 2015 – Expansión

The individuals that owned the large real estate companies during the boom years have suffered from sharp drops in sales and in the value of their assets. The largest has filed for bankruptcy and is now at the mercy of its creditors.

The largest land owner in Spain. The largest real estate company in Europe. Those are some of the descriptions that were used to refer to the large Spanish real estate companies almost a decade ago. At their respective helms were businessmen such as Luis Portillo, Rafael Santamaría and Joaquín Rivero (pictured above, left). As such, they were some of the hardest hit by the burst of the real estate bubble in 2007. After generating revenues of hundreds of millions of euros from the sale of homes, these companies and their managers were unable to cope with the high levels of indebtedness that they had accumulated during the boom years, and so found themselves in precarious situations.

But they are not the only ones who suffered from the effects of the sudden change in the sector. Rivero, a businessman from Jerez, is still dealing with the consequences of his stint at Metrovacesa, fighting a hard battle in the courts against his former partner, Román Sanahuja (pictured above, right), regarding the separation process that resulted in Rivero ending up with Gecina and his former partner with Metrovacesa. Sanahuja’s inability to pay the debts of his family business, Sacresa, meant that he lost control of Metrovacesa to the banks in 2010.

Another company that grew from strength to strength during the boom was Afirma (now Quabit). The company was created from the merger of the former entity Astroc, controlled by Enrique Bañeulos, Landscape and Rayet, a company led by Félix Abánades. After various refinancing processes, the businessman from La Alcarria managed to move forward with the listed real estate company Quabit. However, the same thing did not happen with its parent company, the construction group Rayet, which is now trying to exit from its bankruptcy process.

Francisco Hernando, known as El Pocero, was another one of the most well-known developers. Hernando developed a residential estate in the town of Seseña (Toledo), where he was planning to construct more than 15,000 homes. In the end, just under 5,000 homes were built; 3,000 of those ended up in the hands of the creditor bank as Hernando was unable to pay his debts.

Original story: Expansión (by R. Ruiz)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Bami Newco Files For Voluntary Liquidation

30 January 2015 – Inmodiario

Bami Newco, the real estate company controlled by Joaquín Rivero, which filed for bankruptcy in mid-2013, has now filed for liquidation, according to a ruling issued by the Commercial Court number 2 in Madrid. The company, which has debts of €652 million, proposed its liquidation under the Bankruptcy Law, after it was unable to reach a refinancing agreement with its lender banks.

Bami holds assets amounting to €726 million to meet its liabilities, according to a report published by the insolvency administrator in mid-2014.

The company was founded in 2007 after exiting Metrovacesa’s share capital, a real estate company in which Bami become the controlling shareholder following the takeover it launched in 2004.

The new real estate company voluntarily filed for bankruptcy after, at the end of 2012, Rivero and the Soler family also declared bankrupt the companies through which they channelled the stakes (16.6% and 15.6%, respectively) they then held in the French real estate company Gecina. In 2013, they sold the debt linked to those investments, which were guaranteed by Gecina’s own shares, to the funds Blackstone and Ivanhoé Cambridge.

The company voluntarily filed for bankruptcy after failing to reach a long-term refinancing agreement with its bank syndicate that would have given it the financial stability necessary to continue its activity.

The company has a portfolio of office buildings located in the North of Madrid, totalling 127,500 square metres, with an average occupancy rate of 90%, backed by long-term contracts with highly solvent clients, including several Ibex 35 companies. Moreover, the company had plans to construct two buildings in the “Adequa” business park, which would have resulted in an additional 27,000 sqm.

Bami closed 2012 with a loss of €15 million, as a result of the cancelation of its derivative hedges and the impairment loss it recorded on buildings that had not yet become operational.

Despite having paid the interest on its debt on a timely basis since its constitution, and although most of its debts were due to mature this year, the real estate company decided that filing for bankruptcy was essential, since without long-term, stable financing, the business will be unable to develop its property portfolio and carry out its projects.

Original story: Inmodiario

Translation: Carmel Drake