La Generalitat Resumes the Auction of Various Rental Homes in L’Hospitalet de Llobregat

12 June 2019 – El Confidencial

La Generalitat de Cataluña is resuming the public auction of a rental home portfolio for which it hopes to obtain proceeds €6.2 million, having applied a discount of 20% to the asking price last year (€7.7 million).

The assets in the portfolio are all located in L’Hospitalet de Llobregat (Barcelona) on Calle Ciencies 15-23, next to Plaza Europa and the Gran Vía 2 shopping centre. They comprise 16 homes, 2 commercial premises, 23 parking spaces with storerooms plus 3 terraced single-family homes located in the urbanisation behind that building on Calles Mileva Maric 33 and 49 and Hanna Arendt, 3. In total, the assets have a combined surface area of 2,448 m2 and are leased almost in their entirety, with just one home and the commercial premises vacant.

The assets are owned by Fira 2000, in which the Catalan government holds a 50%, alongside the Town Halls of Barcelona and L’Hospitalet de Llobregat.

The deadline for bids is 22 July and the online auction will be held on 29 July through Addmeet.  

Original story: El Confidencial (by E. Sanz)

Translation/Summary: Carmel Drake

Arcano Sells 2 Buildings in L’Hospitalet de Llobregat to a Family Office for €40M

17 January 2019 – Eje Prime

Arcano is divesting two of its assets. The real estate fund Asoref has sold two buildings in Plaza de Europa, in the Barcelona municipality of L’Hospitalet de Llobregat to a family office for €40 million, according to Expansión.

In the case of the first asset, located at numbers 22 and 24 Plaza de Europa, it is an office building spanning 7,3000 m2, which was acquired by Arcano two years ago and which has been completely renovated and repositioned. The offices, distributed over four above-ground floors, have an occupancy rate of 100%. The tenants of the property include companies such as Aide, Zurich and Vanity Fair.

In the case of the second building, located at number 10 Plaza de Europa, it is a project that is still under construction. The building work is expected to be finished this year at which point the building will have a gross leasable area (GLA) of 5,000 m2.

The two buildings were acquired with Arcano’s first real estate investment fund, which was launched in the summer of 2015 and which had €100 million of capital. Currently, the company is in the process of raising capital for its second fund, Arcano Value Added II. The investment vehicle will amount to between €150 million and €200 million, and €70 million has already been committed.

Original story: Eje Prime

Translation: Carmel Drake

Núñez i Navarro Invests €25M in Site of Former Metalarte Factory to Build 80 Homes

19 October 2018 – Eje Prime

Núñez i Navarro has not forgotten about its land on the site of the former Metalarte factory. The property developer chaired by Josep Lluís Núñez is going to invest €25 million in the construction of a residential development in the Barcelona municipality of Sant Joan Despí.

The company is planning to build eighty homes, in total, with parking spaces and storerooms in the same property, which will be constructed between this autumn and 2021. 61 of the homes in the development will be private, whilst eleven will be social housing units and seven will be granted to the Town Hall of Sant Joan Despí by the Catalan company.

Núñez i Navarro acquired the former Metalarte factory in 2001. Almost twenty years later, the property developer is recovering the land to build its second residential project in the Barcelonan municipality. The company has just carried out a comprehensive renovation of the farmhouse where the Trias de Bes family used to spend its summer holidays to convert it into a school.

At the moment, the Núñez i Navarro group has twenty-three projects underway, corresponding to an investment of €250 million in Cataluña. Barcelona, Sabadell, L’Hospitalet de Llobregat and Sant Joan Despí are the cities chosen by this unlisted property developer to build 947 homes, two hotels, a co-working centre and 69 commercial premises or offices.

In fact, the company is one of the firms in the sector that has best overcome the crisis, with its low debt policy. Proof of that is the investment effort that it has undertaken in the Catalan region over the last five years, where it has disbursed almost €400 million.

Original story: Eje Prime 

Translation: Carmel Drake

Andorran Banks Finance FC Barcelona’s Repurchase of Land in Can Rigalt

16 October 2018 – Eje Prime

FC Barcelona has obtained Andorran financing to purchase Can Rigalt. The Catalan club has signed a €20 million loan over four years with MoraBanc to comply with the ruling won by the real estate company La Llave de Oro for the plots of land, located in L’Hospitalet de Llobregat, according to the sports newspaper Palco23.

The operation in Can Rigalt dates back to 1998 when the board, chaired at the time by Josep Lluís Núñez, acquired those plots near the Camp Nou to build a sports city. Nevertheless, the project was abandoned and it was not until 2005 when the former-President Joan Laporta managed to transfer them to the real estate firm La Llave de Oro for €35.4 million. Nevertheless, the purchase contract included a series of clauses whose breach allowed the company to undo the purchase and recover its money. And that is what has ended up happening.

The most important point and the one that ended up tipping the balance against FC Barcelona during the arbitration proceedings was the obtaining of permits to build homes. The first arbitration award established that 30 July 2014 was the deadline for the club to fulfil and ensure that the Town Hall of L’Hospitalet and the other players involved had facilitated the urban planning process. Nevertheless, the burst of the real estate bubble left the operation up in the air and the group requested a new arbitration award to resolve the operation.

That ruling came in June 2016, when the Arbitration Court of Barcelona corroborated that, after ten years, the requirements established in the purchase contract had not been met. For that reason, it forced the sports entity to return the €35.4 million that it had charged for the land, as well as some legal interest amounting to €11.6 million. The entity tried to negotiate a discount, although its annual report confirms that, in the end, it made the payments established in the ruling.

In the Camp Nou offices, there is not too much hope regarding the future of these plots, which spans 10,000 m2 and have a significant volume of buildable space. In fact, a decision was taken to impair the potential of this asset by €29 million in the accounts for 2016-2017, placing its accounting value at €8.44 million, as revealed by this newspaper. It is “a reasonable valuation established by an independent expert”, says the entity, which trusts that the evolution of technology will allow it to reduce the costs of converting the electricity sub-station next to the land and its transformation is what makes the real estate operation unviable today.

This is not the only urban planning project that FC Barcelona has faced problems with. Laporta also forecast the construction of Barça Park in 2007-2008, a thematic space, next to the Barcelona-El Prat Airport. The club paid €18.74 million for the land, but never managed to overcome the administrative procedures due to the breach of several environmental rules that prevented the development there of any kind of sporting, leisure or training activity. Last year, it applied an additional depreciation of €1.13 million and today its value amounts to just €3.07 million.

Original story: Eje Prime (by M. Menchén)

Translation: Carmel Drake

MK Premium to Invest €8M in Asset Purchases in Barcelona

17 October 2018 – Eje Prime

MK Premium is focusing on Barcelona. The company led by the brothers Daniel and Sergio Leiva is going to invest €8 million in the acquisition of assets in the metropolitan area of Barcelona. With this commitment, the company will make its debut in municipalities such as L’Hospitalet de Llobregat, Badalona and Santa Coloma de Gramenet.

For Daniel Leiva, one of the co-founders of the company, “the time has come to expand our business opportunities to other municipalities bordering the Catalan capital, where there are real estate products that fit with our business model”.

The Catalan family office expects to announce its first purchase in the metropolitan area of Barcelona in the coming weeks. Moreover, the company is going to continue to renovate its properties to improve their conditions and returns.

These plans coincide with MK Premium’s business strategy over the medium term. The company is planning to expand its capital estate by 50% and to extend its presence to other cities in Spain.

Founded in 2012, MK Premium owns buildings in Madrid and in Portugal – it first expanded to that country at the end of December. The Spanish real estate firm is planning to increase its real estate investment by 15% this year and close 2018 with a profit, following the acquisition of more than eighty assets.

Original story: Eje Prime

Translation: Carmel Drake

Neinor & La Llave de Oro to Build 2 Residential Towers in Barcelona

10 October 2018 – Eje Prime

Neinor Homes and La Llave de Oro are joining forces to unblock two projects in Plaza Europa, L’Hospitalet de Llobregat. The property developers have jointly invested €20 million in the construction of two buildings that are going to add a total of 172 new homes to this municipality in Barcelona.

The construction of the buildings is going to be entrusted to Inbisa Construcción, which has already started work, expected to be finished within eighteen months. Neinor is going to develop one of the towers, which will contain 77 homes and which will be added to the development of 91 homes that the company led by Juan Velayos already has under construction in Plaza Europa. Meanwhile, La Llave de Oro will do the same with the second building, which will be 70m tall and will contain 95 homes.

These are two of the few plots that have not been developed yet in Plaza Europa de L’Hospitalet, an area focused primarily on the office market, which was first developed in 2007.

The area’s tenants include companies such as Inbisa, KPMG and GB Foods. Currently, the occupancy rate exceeds 85% with rents ranging between €14/m2/month and €16/m2/month, according to data from Savills Aguirre Newman.

Original story: Eje Prime

Translation: Carmel Drake

Stoneweg Plans to Build New Homes in Barcelona & along the Costa Brava

10 October 2018 – Eje Prime

Stoneweg is continuing to grow its portfolio of projects in Cataluña. The Spanish-Swiss fund is strongly committed to the territory and has already announced new developments in Barcelona and the Costa Brava.

Two of the most important projects are going to be developed on two prime streets in the centre of Barcelona, namely Rambla Catalunya and Pau Claris. The company led by Joaquín Castellví and Jaume Sabater declined to share more details about these future homes, according to Expansión. The real estate company is going to unveil the two developments at the next Barcelona Meeting Point, which will be held in the Catalan capital between 25th and 28th October.

Meanwhile, in L’Hospitalet de Llobregat, the fund is going to build two towers containing 276 homes on the site of the former Cosme Toda factory, a plan that was announced in March, when a €370 million investment plan was registered to build 800 new homes in Cataluña.

The sought-after 22@ district for the office market is also of interest to the company, which is planning a development on Calle Llull. In the meantime, on the Costa Brava, Stoneweg has started projects in the residential market in Palamós, Platja d’Aro, Roses and Begur.

Original story: Eje Prime 

Translation: Carmel Drake

La Generalitat to Auction c.20 Homes in Barcelona for €6M

29 May 2018 – Eje Prime

La Generalitat is going to auction off inhabited homes in Barcelona. The Catalan government is going to sell around twenty homes in L’Hospitalet de Llobregat for an asking price of €7.7 million in the first auction and €6.2 million in the second, according to information provided in La Generalitat’s Official Gazette.

The residential portfolio for sale comprises 16 homes and three detached houses, all of which are rental properties and all of which are currently occupied. The auction will be conducted in blocks in order to prevent the tenants from using the right of first refusal over their own homes. Nevertheless, the future owner of the homes is going to have to subrogate the lease contracts.

The apartments for sale are located opposite Plaza Europa and the Gran Vía 2 shopping centre in L’Hospitalet, at numbers 15-23 Calle Ciencies. In those blocks, in addition to the homes, La Generalitat is going to auction off two premises and 23 parking spaces with storerooms. With regard to the detached family homes, they are located on another urbanisation, on Calles Mileva Maric and Hanna Arendt.

The current tenants of the apartments pay between €800, in the case of the homes with the oldest rents, and €1,600 per month for the detached family homes. Each home has a surface area that ranges between 78 m2 and 120 m2 and has two, three or four bedrooms.

The auction, which will see the deadline for the presentation of offers close on 9 July, will be held on the 19th of that same month through Addmeet, the online real estate platform that has already managed other large public sales in other Spanish cities.

Original story: Eje Prime

Translation: Carmel Drake

Núñez i Navarro Invests €4.2M In Office Refurb

1 December 2017 – Eje Prime

Núñez i Navarro is strengthening its commitment to the office sector. On Thursday, the real estate developer presented a new office project in L’Hospitalet de Llobregat (Barcelona). The building in question is the Marina Factory, whose remodelling is going to involve an investment of €4.2 million.

The work on the property will be completed in March next year, after 19 months. The asset, located at number 450 Rambla Marina, has six floors measuring 1,200 m2 and 1,430 m2 and two retail premises. In total, it has capacity to house 1,000 people throughout its 10,000 m2.

The Marina Factory is located in an up-and-coming area of L’Hospitalet de Llobregat. The boost from Plaza Europa, which is two kilometres away from the office, has converted the area into a first-rate office district, with companies such as the perfume group Puig, the consultancy firm KPMG and the group Gallina Blanca choosing to locate there.

Núñez i Navarro is one of the largest Catalan property developers and one of the companies in the sector that has best overcome the crisis, with a policy of low indebtedness.

Original story: Eje Prime

Translation: Carmel Drake

Slim Commissions Sale Of Torre Realia In Barcelona For €140M

7 June 2017 – El Confidencial

(…). Torre Realia BCN is the jewel in the crown of FCC’s subsidiary in Cataluña and, moreover, it is located in a thriving area which has been witness to some of the most interesting real estate operations of recent times: Plaza Europa, the new business district within the Catalan capital’s area of influence.

With this cover letter, the group controlled by Carlos Slim has decided to put the skyscraper on the market and has engaged JLL and BNP Paribas to find a buyer, according to several sources close to the operation.

A spokesman for Realia refused to confirm the operation, which has reportedly been orchestrated directly by Gerardo Kuri Kauffman, one of the right-hand men of the Mexican magnate in Spain and the CEO of the real estate company.

The decision to sell this genuine trophy asset comes just after the real estate company signed a new syndicated loan amounting to €582 million, aimed at refinancing the €678 million debt that expired in April and which threatened the viability of the group.

To finish sorting out the financial situation, the company was also planning to sell the Los Cubos building in Madrid, an operation that never ended up being closed due to Slim’s high price expectations.

New business district

Realia is hoping to obtain €140 million for this sought-after property, which measures 112 m tall, over 24 storeys, with a gross leasable area of 31,960 m2 and 399 parking spaces. It is aware of the growing interest that exists amongst the large real estate companies to establish themselves in the new business district.

The skyscraper is, precisely, one of the most iconic buildings in this thriving area and is the image that identifies the zone. The property houses the headquarters of KPMG in Barcelona and has seen its value rise in recent months, thanks to the wave of operations that have taken place in this enclave and the growing number of large corporations that are moving their headquarters to this new financial district, in L’Hospitalet de Llobregat.

The main player in two of the operations that are transforming the area is the Puig family, one of the most important corporate sagas in Cataluña, which has completed a double whammy, by teaming up with Colonial to promote a 14,000 m2 tower in Plaza Europa 46-48, which is right opposite Grupo Puig’s headquarters, a building that it has just purchased from BBVA for around €60 million.

Arcano has also been active in the area with its acquisition of an office building located at Plaza Europa 22-24 for €13 million. That property has a gross leasable area of 7,335 m2, plus another 452 m2 of storerooms, 83 of its own parking spaces and 164 administrative concession parking spaces, which it plans to completely remodel after the summer.

Original story: El Confidencial (by Ruth Ugalde)

Translation: Carmel Drake