Tag: sales price

BBVA Sells 9 Properties From CX RE Fund For €37M

2 June 2017 – Europa Press

BBVA Asset Management has sold nine properties from the CX Propietat real estate fund for €37 million in total. That price is 20.96% lower than the most recent appraisal value of the aforementioned assets.

According to a statement filed by the asset manager with Spain’s National Securities and Exchange Commission (CNMV), this sale represents an “important step forward” in the liquidation of the CX Propietat fund. The fund filed for liquidation in September 2013, before BBVA acquired the former Catalan savings bank Catalunya Banc (CX).

The asset manager is going to continue making “its best efforts” to facilitate the complete liquidation of this fund “as soon as possible”, said the company to the supervisor.

According to sources at BBVA, once the sales process for the fund’s entire portfolio has been completed, the definitive liquidation value will be calculated.

Original story: Europa Press

Translation: Carmel Drake

BBVA Finalises Sale Of Torre Puig To Grupo Puig

22 May 2017 – BBVA

BBVA has finalised the sale of Torre Puig to Grupo Puig, one of the largest real estate operations in Barcelona. The sales prices is reportedly in line with pre-crisis levels.

The property is a tower located in Hospitalet de Llobregat, one of the largest real estate expansion areas. The building has 21 floors and covers a surface area of 14,300 m2. The Grupo Puig has occupied the property to date.

The building was constructed by the former Catalunya Caixa (CX) for the perfume group Puig. The building was designed by architect Rafael Monea and GCA Arquitectos. The headquarters was completed three years ago, coinciding with BBVA’s purchase of CX.

BBVA’s real estate strategy

The sale of these types of portfolios is one of the channels established by the bank to reduce its real estate exposure, a strategic objective for BBVA’s Strategy and M&A area. In line with this strategy, in March, BBVA completed its second sale of a wholesale portfolio in 2017 (Project Boston), following the divestment of 3,400 properties (Project Buffalo) in February.

Original story: BBVA

Translation: Carmel Drake

Deutsche Bank Lost €68M On Operation Tag

8 May 2017 – Voz Pópuli

Deutsche Bank España recorded losses of €68 million on so-called Operation Tag, which was agreed last October, and which involved the sale of a portfolio of non-performing loans and real estate assets to the fund Oaktree for €430 million. And, the negative result from that operation drastically reduced the entity’s profit last year, which fell from €91.4 million in 2015 to €5.7 million in 2016.

The operation involved the sale of a loan portfolio that contained “a series of loans that had already been recognised as non-performing”, as well as foreclosed assets. The bank acknowledges in its most recent annual financial report that the sale “had a negative impact of €68.1 million on the entity’s income statement”. Of that amount, €40.4 million corresponded to the sale of the loan portfolio and €4.7 million to the sale of the foreclosed properties.

Part of the agreed sale of the properties was signed during the first quarter of 2017. They included assets located in Cataluña, which had a gross value on the group’s books of €7 million and which ended up being sold for €4.4 million. The other real estate assets had a book value of €29 million but their sales price was much lower, €8.1 million.

Operation Tag also had an additional cost of €23 million for Deutsche Bank España. The costs arising from the sale amounted to €8.1 million and those relating to adapting the workforce to the new structure amounted to €14.9 million.

Early retirement

In 2016, Deutsche Bank España processed the early retirement of 108 employees, compared with 24 early retirees in 2015. The entity explains in its latest accounts that the amount of pensions caused, €155 million, corresponds to commitments for pensions caused with the retiring and early-retiring employees and that those commitments are “insured or provisioned by an internal fund”. Last year, the bank recognised a provision of €13.9 million for early retirees.

In March, Deutsche Bank announced its plans to sell its retail business in Spain. The entity currently serves more than 700,00 clients in the country and employs almost 2,600 people in its retail division.

Original story: Voz Pópuli (by Alberto Ortín)

Translation: Carmel Drake

The Lara Family Sells Roca Junyent’s HQ For €55M+

3 October 2016 – Expansión

The Lara family, owner of Planeta, has sold the historical headquarters of Roca Junyent on Calle Aribau in Barcelona for more than €55 million. The buyer, a real estate fund linked to the Swiss bank UBS, will maintain the long-term lease contract with the law firm Miquel Roca, which occupies eight of the building’s twelve floors. The four remaining floors are leased to the medical centre QMS (Quality Medical Service).

The building has a surface area of 11,000 sqm, of which 8,600 sqm are used offices, 1,360 sqm are used as a commercial space on the ground floor, which is occupied by QMS, and a basement measuring 1,270 sqm.

The Lara family’s real estate company, Inversiones Hemisferio, bought the building from Colonial in 2007, just before the burst of the real estate bubble for €55 million and it has now sold it for a slightly higher figure.

This operation confirms that investment prices of buildings in Barcelona have now returned to their pre-crisis levels, driven by a shortage of assets for sale and the priority of large funds to invest in the real estate sector.

Despite the strong international demand to invest in cities such as Barcelona, the volume of investment in the city’s real estate sector is lower so far in 2016 than it was this time last year. In 2015, the Catalan capital broke records, with total investment of €2,000 million. Of that, 85% came from international buyers.

Despite the sluggish first half of 2016, which the sector attributed to the lack of assets for sale and the political uncertainty, the second half of the year has started with more movement in the investment market and all indications are that the final quarter of the year will be very busy in terms of the closure of operations whose negotiations are already being finalised.

Original story: Expansión (by M. Anglés and J. Orihuel)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Petrus Builds More Luxury Homes In Madrid & Barcelona

26 September 2016 – Expansión

The adventures of the property developer Petrus in Colombia are bearing fruit. In 2013, faced with the slow recovery of the Spanish real estate market, the Rabassa family decided to expands its borders and try its luck on the other side of the pond. It landed in Barranquilla (Colombia), a country that did not promise the best growth prospects, but did offer the best guarantees in terms of business security, thanks to obligations such as a fiduciary for the duration of the construction work.

Following the success of the first development, containing 64 homes, Petrus has now started to construct a second building in the city, containing 56 homes and is already making plans for a third residential block, which will house another 64 flats. The total investment in these three projects will amount to €22 million.

Petrus, founded by Luis Rabassa in 1964, is currently owned by three members of the third generation: Luis and Sergio Rabassa, and their cousin, Bruno Rabassa. Last year, the company recorded revenues of €25.4 million and this year it expects that figure to grow by 6.6% to €27.1 million.

Meanwhile, in Spain, the property developer is continuing to start new projects, although “we are studying the behaviour of consumers and the market very closely”, said Luis Rabassa.

In Madrid, Petrus has started to build a 22-home development in the neighbourhood of Salamanca, which will be sold for €5,500/sqm. In Barcelona, it is also constructing an 18-home development in L’Hospitalet de Llobregat.

Original story: Expansión (by Marisa Anglés)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Ministry Of Development: Urban Land Prices Rose By 6.6% In Q2

16 September 2016 – Expansión

The market for urban land is starting to show signs of recovery. The price of plots of land rose by 6.6% during the second quarter of the year, to amount to €163.4/sqm. It is the best figure since Q4 2012, although it is still light years away from the peak recorded in 2007, at the height of the real estate boom, when prices reached €285/sqm.

One of the main conclusions coming out of the statistics published yesterday by the Ministry of Development is that, thanks to the real estate pull in the capital and Barcelona, the Community of Madrid and Cataluña account for almost half of the market for urban land. Specifically, they accounted for a total sales volume of €351.9 million, i.e. 47% of the total volume for Spain (€751.1 million). This most recent figure is 21.7% higher than a year ago. The total surface area sold in Spain amounted to 5.6 million sqm, up by 7.7%.

The total value of land sold soared by 85% in Barcelona and by 11% in Madrid.

The number of transactions grew by 16% YoY across Spain. In April, May and June, 4,435 plots of land were sold, compared to 3,819 during Q2 2015. The most significant increase was recorded in municipalities with more than 50,000 inhabitants, where sales rose by 20%. In towns with between 10,000 and 50,000 inhabitants, there were 1,580 transactions, up by 24.6%.

In municipalities with more than 50,000 inhabitants, the highest average prices were reported in the provinces of Barcelona (€485/sqm, equivalent to triple the average for Spain), Madrid (€456/sqm) and the Balearic Islands (€373/sqm). The lowest prices were recorded in Guadalajara (€72.6/sqm, less than half the national average), Cádiz (€100/sqm) and Tarragona (€101.4/sqm).

Prices rose by just 0.1% in the cities, given that Madrid pushed down the statistics with a decrease of 14%. According to the real estate consultant, José Luis Ruiz Bartolomé, that is a result of the comparison with data from 2015, when “there was very little urban land available in Madrid, and investors sought refuge in plots of land in the most solvent areas, whilst this year land sales have spread across the whole city and are no longer limited to just the central areas”.

In Barcelona, the increase in land prices amounted to 3.5% during Q2 2016.

The Ministry of Development also published statistics yesterday about the appraisal value of unsubsidised homes, which rose by 2% YoY to €1,506.4/sqm in Q2 2016.

After 26 quarters of YoY decreases in house prices, which began at the end of 2008, “this data represents the fifth consecutive quarter of nominal price increases”, said the Ministry. In real terms, in other words, accounting for the effect of inflation, the increase amounted to 2.9%.

Ten autonomous regions reported YoY increases, led by the Balearic Islands (+5.9%), Madrid (+4.8%), Cataluña (+4.6%), the Canary Islands (+2.9%), Extremadura (+2.4%), Ceuta and Melilla (+2.3%) and Galicia (+1.4%). By contrast, the other regions reported YoY decreases – in appraisal prices, not in sales prices – led by Navarra (with a decrease of -2.2%), Aragón (-1.9%), País Vasco (-1.7%) and Cantabria (-1.3%).

House values are now 28.3% lower than their maximum levels, reached during Q1 2008. (…).

Original story: Expansión (by Juanma Lamet)

Translation Carmel Drake

Lone Star Puts ‘Rivas Futura’ Retail Park Up For Sale

9 July 2015 – Cinco Días

The opportunistic fund Lone Star has put the Rivas Futura retail park, in the Madrilenian town of Rivas Vaciamadrid, up for sale. The retail space covers an area of more than 40,000 m2 and includes around 30 large stores, such as Toys’r’us, Leroy Merlin, Media Markt, Decathlon, Kiab and Prenatal.

The retail park opened in May 2006. In 2008, the insurance company Axa Reim purchased it from Avantis for €81 million. Subsequently, it was included in Eurohypo’s secured loan portfolio.

The asset was subsequently included in the so-called Project Octopus, loans that were sold by Commerzbank (after its acquisition of Eurohypo), which Lone Star ended up purchasing.

This retail park currently has an occupancy rate of 80% and market sources say that the sales price could stand at around €70 million. The transaction has been brokered by Knight Frank, which has declined to comment on proceedings.

In Spain, Lone Star also acquired Kutxabank’s real estate arm, Neinor, last December, for €930 million and obtained control over the former Basque cajas’ property management platform. This fund, led by Juan Pepa in Spain, is committed to the residential market, through Neinor, and has plans to invest up to €1,000 million in land.

Original story: Cinco Días (by Alfonso Simón Ruiz)

Translation: Carmel Drake