Tag: Princeton

Madrid’s Town Hall Definitively Approves the Mahou-Calderón Development

15 November 2018 – El Confidencial

The final piece of the puzzle has fallen into place. The Governing Board of the Town Hall of Madrid has definitively approved the urbanisation plans for the Mahou-Calderón project after the corresponding period of public consultation came to an end on Thursday. This means that the owners of the land can now start work. The plenary of the Town Hall will ratify the final project over the coming weeks, although the claims phase is not, in theory, expected to alter the plan initially approved in July: it involves a budget of €42.2 million, will see the transformation of 193,804 m2 of land in total and will be executed in three phases in just under three years. The first phase will involve the demolition of the stadium.

The demolition of the Atlético de Madrid’s temple, an operation that will cost €22.4 million, will be the first piece of work to be carried out, with the exception of the stand located above the M-30, which will remain in place to interfere as little as possible with the traffic on that road. Subsequently, the traffic from the motorway ring-road will be diverted so that the stand can be demolished. The first stage will also include the urbanisation of the roads between Paseo de los Pontones, Paseo Imperial and Paseo de los Melancólicos.

Once those first projects have been concluded, phase 2 will begin, which will see the reorganisation of Paseo de los Melancólicos and Calle Duque de Tovar, with a budget of €7.7 million. Finally, the third phase, with a final budget of more than €12 million, will include the creation of a new park by the river, which, in any case, will come after Calle-30 has been covered over, by the Town Hall. Specifically, the Town Hall has committed to providing €60 million to finance the work to cover over that road, a budget that is separate from the urbanisation project that has been approved today because it was agreed that it would be processed independently.

The Governing Board chaired by Manuela Carmena gave the final green light to this project today, which is going to be financed by the Compensation Board that comprises the landowners (Atlético and Mahou). The surface area of the space is broken down into two sections, one of which is dedicated to residential and tertiary use, and the other to roads, green areas and basic amenities.

The land dedicated to residential use occupies 33,339 m2 (with a buildability of 132,344 m2) of which 13,243 m2 will be for social housing properties, which represents more than 11% of the total. Meanwhile, tertiary use land will have a buildability of 14,705 m2. Finally, the land dedicated to social uses will span 13,893 m2 for public amenities. In addition, 73,099 m2 will be dedicated to green space and 73,469 m2 to roads .

In any case, this final procedure paves the way for the construction work to begin and for one of the major urban planning operations in the city to be unblocked. It has been in the hands of the Department for Sustainable Urban Development, led by José Manuel Calvo. As this newspaper published in the summer, the initial approval of the plan – which today received definitive approval – was a key step for the plans of Atlético de Madrid. The football club suspended the process to sell its urban planning rights in January, as it was waiting to be able to offer the three interested finalists – Solvia, Ibosa and Princeton – a series of guarantees, including the reparcelation and urbanisation project, amongst others.

With the sale of its urban planning rights, Atlético de Madrid is hoping to raise almost €200 million, an amount that it is hoping to use to repay the Mexican businessman Carlos Slim for the €160 million loan that he granted  to Enrique Cerezo’s club to finance the completion of the construction of the new stadium, the Wanda Metropolitano (…).

Original story: El Confidencial (by Paloma Esteban)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Madrid’s Town Hall to Approve the Mahou-Calderón Project

18 July 2018 – Eje Prime

The Mahou-Calderón project is pushing ahead. Tomorrow (Thursday), the Town Hall of Madrid is going to approve the urban development plan for the land, one of the most sought-after plots in the Spanish capital. The roadmap for the site, which is still home to the Vicente Calderón stadium, the historical home of Atlético de Madrid, means that the construction work will begin after the summer and will be scheduled for completion within three years.

After the summer, Atlético de Madrid and Mahou, the owners of the batch of land, hope that the period of public consultation will be completed so that they can start to demolish the stadium, according to El Confidencial.

The building work will be divided into three phases, starting with the demolition of the Calderón. Next, and after modifying the traffic flow that passes under the pitch, the roads between Paseo de los Pontones, Paseo Imperial and Paseo de los Melancólicos are going to be urbanised.

The first phase of the project is also going to be the most expensive, with an investment of €22.7 million, half of the total budget established (€42.2 million) for this ambitious urban development plan. The Government of Madrid is going to contribute another €60 million to cover over the road.

The finalists: Solvia, Ibosa and Princeton 

Waiting to see what happens tomorrow in the Town Hall are Solvia, Ibosa and Princeton, the three finalist investors looking to buy the plots, which will expand Madrid’s residential stock by another 33,339 m2 of buildable land, located on a plot with a buildable surface area of 132,344 m2.

The objective of Atlético de Madrid with this project is to raise up to €200 million from the sale operation. The club is planning to use that extraordinary capital to repay Carlos Slim the €160 million loan that he granted the sporting entity to complete the building work on its current stadium, the Wanda Metropolitano.

Original story: Eje Prime 

Translation: Carmel Drake

Aelca, Ibosa, Amenabar, Pryconsa, Libra & Princeton Compete For Calderón Plots

18 November 2017 – El Economista

Atlético de Madrid has already received its first offers from investors interested in acquiring the plots of land adjacent to the Vicente Calderón stadium. The sale represents the largest land operation currently underway in the centre of Madrid and the football club is taking advantage of that fact to try to find a buyer willing to pay double the current prices in the area.

According to several sources in the sector, the companies that have bid to acquire these plots of land include the property developer Aelca, in which Värde holds a stake. It is the only one of the four large real estate companies still in the process, given that Neinor, Aedas and Vía Célere have all ruled out participating in the operation, due to its high price.

The same sources state that Grupo Ibosa is another one of the firms that is pushing ahead with the purchase process; and it is doing so with the backing of a fund. Similarly, the property developers Amenabar and Pryconsa have also submitted bids, as has the cooperative manager Libra Gestión.

The British family office Princeton is another name that appears on the list of investors interested in the Calderdón. That firm arrived in Spain at the beginning of 2015 and since then has closed several residential operations as well as a handful of others of a tertiary nature.

CBRE, which is advising the operation, will receive the binding offers at the end of November, with the aim of trying to close the sale before the end of the year. Atlético de Madrid wants to repay Carlos Slim on time for the more than €160 million that he loaned the Club, through the company Inbursa, to finance the works on the new stadium, Wanda Metropolitano.

The land up for sale is divided into three plots (RC-4, RC-7 and RC-8) and together cover more than 63,000 m2. The largest space corresponds to private residential use and the rest to tertiary use. The amount that Atlético de Madrid expects to receive for this operation, according to real estate sources in the know, comes to €200 million, which places the price per square metre in a very high range, of around €3,300/m2. In this way, the c. 480 homes that will be constructed on the site, will have to be sold for around €6,000/m2 if the operation is to be profitable for the buyer. It is precisely these figures that have deterred the large listed real estate companies, as well as those that have financial backing from funds, given that they must fulfil the returns they have promised to their shareholders and investors in every operation.

First obstacles

Although the project known as Mahou-Calderón, which encompasses the sale of these plots, has already received provisional approval from the Town Hall of Madrid, it is still awaiting definitive approval from the Community of Madrid’s Urban Planning Committee, which has four months to analyse the one-off amendment to the PGOU, and the Community of Madrid’s Governing Council, according to José Manuel Calvo, a Councillor for the Town Hall of Madrid, in an interview for the El Economista’s Inmobiliaria magazine.

Nevertheless, on Wednesday, it was revealed that the Ministry for the Environment and Land Planning had identified a “calculation error” in the buildability coefficients, and has urged the municipal technicians to correct the errors in order “to prevent the operation from being susceptible to being challenged in the courts in the future”, said sources from the Ministry to EP.

Original story: El Economista (by Alba Brualla)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Princeton Acquires c/Mazarredo 7, Next To Google Campus

9 March 2016 – Noticias CBRE

The British family office Princeton has closed the acquisition of the building on Calle Mazarredo 7, in Madrid, in a deal advised by CBRE, the world leading real estate consultancy and services company. The property, situated in a strategic location next to the headquarters of the Google Campus, has a surface area of 4,000 m2 spread across 5 floors.

It is a unique, listed building next to the Manzanares River, located in the new technological area of Madrid that has become fashionable thanks to the arrival of the Google Campus. The building will be leased to companies who want to be located in the area of influence around the technology giant’s headquarters.

Princeton is the investment vehicle of the Lee family, the former owners of the company Imry Property Holdings, which was listed on the London Stock Exchange for more than 25 years. Since the sale of the company, the Lee family has undertaken significant investments in Europe, the UK and the USA, often in partnership with major institutional investors. In April 2015, it acquired a building measuring 10,600 m2 on Calle Fomento, 2, in the Plaza de Santo Domingo, close to Gran Vía, which shows this investor’s commitment to the Spanish market. Following that operation, its purchase of the building on Calle Mazarredo, 7, next to the Google Campus in Madrid, constitutes Princeton’s second acquisition in Spain.

In this way, we are beginning to see the impact of the Google Campus on the area. The headquarters of the technology firm opened its doors last June in the Madrilenian district of Arganzuela, with the aim of becoming a meeting point for entrepreneurs and creatives, and in response to the growing demand in the city for shared work spaces. According to Paloma Relinque, the National Director for Capital Market Foreign Investments at CBRE, “the arrival of the Google Campus is generating an environment of entrepreneurship and a technological meeting point that is impacting the whole area. Demand is very high and it is unlikely that the Campus will be sufficiently large to satisfy it, which means there will be entrepreneurs looking for co-working spaces in the surrounding area”.

Original story: Noticias CBRE

Translation: Carmel Drake