Tag: solvia

Solvia Will Take Over Management Of Ceiss’s Assets From Next Week

26 February 2015 – Expansión

From next week, Solvia, the real estate arm of Banco Sabadell, will gradually incorporate assets from Sareb, the so-called bad bank, into its managament portfolio. Specifically, it will take over the management of assets that were originally held by Banco Ceiss.

In November last year, the Asset Managament Company for Bank Restructurings (Sareb) awarded Solvia, the real estate arm and recovery platform of Banco Sabadell, the management of a portfolio of 42,900 assets that had been originally held by Bankia, Banco Gallego and Banco Ceiss.

In total, 7,000 assets were held by Banco Ceiss; they will be added to those from Banco Gallego that Solvia is already managing. Only the management of the assets originally held by Bankia will remain pending; and that is expected to happen within the next few months”, according to Solvia.

Original story: Expansión

Translation: Carmel Drake

RE Managers Ranking: Solvia & Anida Vie With Vulture Funds

25 February 2015 – El Confidencial

Banco Sabadell and its real estate arm Solvia have infiltrated the top ranking of (Spain’s) real estate managers, which mainly includes vulture funds. These funds now have (assets under management amounting to) €278,000 million.

The international funds have consolidated their position as the new players in the real estate sector after Sareb’s latest auction. In fact, together, the so-called vulture funds control a portfolio of assets amounting to more than €278,000 million, including land; properties; and mortgage and developer debt. There are some important exceptions (in the ranking), such as Solvia (Banco Sabadell) and Anida (BBVA), but the top positions are held by institutional investors such as TPG (Servihabitat), Cerberus (Haya Real Estate) and Apollo (Altamira), who monopolise the sector.

Following the bid for Sareb’s assets, the largest manager or servicer is Servihabitat, owned by Caixabank (51%) and the US fund TPG (49%). In total, the company manages €58,698 million, having taken on €19,725 million from Sareb. The entity was already ranked first or second-place, depending on whether the loans in its portfolio were included in the calculations, rather than just the properties.

Since the start of the year, Servihabitat has controlled 21% of the assets of the so-called servicers, including properties and loans. Following the auction, it now also manages assets of Nova Caixa Galicia, Liberbank and Banco de Valencia. This hegemony has been thanks to Sareb’s most recent auction, which was held less than two months ago, which awarded portfolios amounting to €41,200 million. The assets (awarded in that auction) have been managed by the winning companies since 1 January 2015.

The main upset (in the rankings) has been Banco Sabadell and its real estate arm Solvia, which has infiltrated the ranking of the top property managers in Spain. The bank was one of the few that did not sell its real estate portfolio to the vulture funds, like most of its competitors did, and as a result, it has become the fourth largest entity in the (servicing) sector, a surprise gate-crasher to the party, with assets of €39,765 million. Of this amount, €17,187 million came from the most recent auction, in the form of assets that came from Bankia. 43% of the assets that Solvia now manages came from Sareb. It has a 13% share of that market.

Off the podium

In this sense, another important development is that of Apollo. Previously it was the sixth largest player. Now, following the auction and its purchase of Altamira from Banco Santander for €700 million at the end of 2013, it has risen to third place. This bronze medal position reflects the fact that Altamira-Apollo now manages €46,566 million. It has acquired more than half of its property and loan (€26,056 million) from Sareb. The entity has a 17% share of Sareb’s market.

These increases have been achieved at the expense of another operator, Anida, which has dropped down the rankings to fifth place. Anida is the real estate arm of BBVA and has more than €25,000 million assets under management. It is one of only a handful of companies of this type, which, like Solvia, has not allowed foreign funds to participate in its capital. Neither Anida nor Aliseda, which was sold by Banco Popular to Värde Partners and Kennedy Wilson for €815 million, participated in the most recent auction and so they lost size in a business where critical mass is fundamental.

Haya Real Estate, owned by Cerberus, is still the entity that depends most heavily on the Sareb. It controls assets that mainly come from Bankia and so 65% of its portfolio depends on the Sareb contract, much more than Altamira (55%) and Solvia (43%).

By contrast, from all of the large players, Servihabitat is the one that is least dependent on the bad bank, despite having won some of the lots it has auctioned, since it already had a significant asset base. It depends on Sareb for 33% of its portfolio only, which means, on paper, that it should have a higher operating management margin than its closest competitors.

Original story: El Confidencial (by Marcos Lamelas)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Vertix Returns To The Real Estate Market With 180 Homes

9 February 2015 – Expansión

Felip Massot has appointed his daughter, Elena, as the sold director and CEO of Vertix to replace Francisco Pérez, who has joined Solvia as the new Regional Director of Cataluña.

Vertix is one of the few real estate developers that has been saved from the crisis, although it is now only a fraction of the size it once was. Whilst in 2006, the company, owned by Felip Massot, generated revenues of €200 million and constructed homes at a breakneck pace; in 2014, it recorded a turnover of €50 million and is currently building only around 180 homes, all in the Barcelona area and in locations where demand is guaranteed.

Original story: Expansión (by Marisa Ángeles)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Sabadell Puts €250m NPL Portfolio Up For Sale

29 January 2015 – Expansión

Opportunistic funds / “Project Cadi” includes non-performing loans that the entity once granted to real estate developers

Banco Sabadell is making progress in its strategy to reduce the volume of foreclosed assets and bad debt on its books. The financial group led by Josep Oliu, which today releases its results for 2014, has just put an NPL portfolio worth €250 million up for sale.

According to market sources, the so-called Project Cadi includes non-performing loans that were once granted to real estate developers. Through Solvia, Sabadell is taking a very active role in packaging these types of loans, in the face of strong buyer interest from opportunistic funds that are now active in the Spanish market. At the beginning of the month, the bank already disposed of another portfolio worth €435 million (Project Tritón), which included 630 non-performing loans to small- and medium-sized developers, as well as 700 foreclosed assets in Valencia, Andalucía, Cataluña and the Balearic Islands. This sale was put together through a bond issue, acquired by Deutsche Bank and Hipoges. Sabadell may already be sounding out the market with a view to selling other portfolios over the next few months.

This type of transaction reflects the confidence that funds have in the recovery of the real estate market in Spain. In parallel, banks are interested in this kind of transaction because they lighten their balance sheets and allow them to generate income from assets that are no longer productive and that have already been provisioned. According to sector sources, these transactions are closed with discounts of around 75%, which means that the funds are paying the financial institutions 25% of the nominal value of the loans.

The largest transaction of this kind in Spain was closed in 2014 by Blackstone, which acquired a €6,392 million mortgage portfolio from Catalunya Banc. Lone Star and JP Morgan also bought loans from Eurohypo amounting to €4,500 million. Other funds that have acquired portfolios include Aiqon, Lindorff, Cerberus and Starwood.

Original story: Expansión (by S. Saborit and J. Zuloaga)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Banco Sabadell Ready to Float Its New Socimi With €700 Mn in Assets

29/10/2014 – Expansion

Solvia, property servicer of Banco Sabadell, is giving the finishing touch to transformation of its real estate investment fund into a Socimi (Spanish counterpart of a REIT firm) already having a portfolio consisting of residential, logistics and tertiary assets valued at €700 million.

As the entity chaired by Josep Oliu informed, the process aims at ‘attracting new institutional investors’. Solvia will cast nets on them today at Barcelona Meeting Point held in the Montjuïc de Fira fair in Barcelona.

The servicer‘s directors created a special Real Estate Management area responsible exclusively for design and administration of investment vehicles. Main objective of the creation will be to ‘maximize the ROI through advisory and overall management’.

In general, funcions of Socimis cover acquisition, development and rehabilitation of urban assets intended for rent, both directly and through other Socimis.

 

Original article: Expansión 

Translation: AURA REE

Sabadell’s Property Fund to Join the List of Socimis

1/10/2014 – Expansion

Banco Sabadell progresses on its plan to float several REIT firms, known as Socimis in Spain. By converting the real estate fund into such an investment vehicle, the entity aims at opening doors to institutional investors.

Sabadell BS Inmobiliario, since it is referred to, is one of the market veterans: set up in 2004, the fund manages a €1 billion worth of property. Today, the bank is the only owner of the holding as all shareholders left in March this year. Instead of closing and liquidating its fund, like other entities did, Sabadell decided to hand out equity to stakeholders.

Now, the bank preps the fund for listing it as a Socimi, possibly still before the year ends. With view to the move, Sabadell filed for an appraisal of the fund’s properties which include mostly tertiary (hospitals and offices), residential and industrial assets for rent.

Solvia – the Manager

If the plan comes true, the new Socimi will be administered by Solvia, the REO servicer of the bank. Solvia is also forging a fund intended for 30 hotel assets worth €1 billion in total. Odds are high for the vehicle to go public one day, too.

At the end of 2013, Sabadell BS Inmobiliario possessed 24 office complexes, three hospitals, 1.600 dwellings, 3.200 parking spaces, 69 retails and three industrial warehouses. Total area of these properties spreads over almost half a million of lettable square meters. Among the rented buildings one may find the Quiron hospitals in Barcelona, San Sebastian and Bilbao, the headquarters of Telvent (now Schneider Electric) and Urbaser in Madrid and Faurecia manufactures in Barcelona, Navarre and Valencia. One of its units stands in Paris.

Original article: Expansión (by S. Saborit)

Translation: AURA REE

Sabadell Chooses Solvia & Plans to Launch It on the Stock Market

27/03/2014 – Cinco Dias

The tremendous interest awoken last year among international funds found its reflection in such millionths transaction as the sale of Altamira (Santander) to Apollo, Aliseda (Popular) to consortium of Kennedy Wilson and Värde Partners, Servihabitat (CaixaBank) to TPG or Bankia Habitat to Cerberus. Solvia, Sabadell´s real estate manager, was expected to be the next to change the owner in 2014.

However, the bank decided to rush against the tide and invest in its company with view to future listing. At a recent press conference Josep Oliu, Sabadell´s head officer said that they “conducted profound analysis and chose adequate strategy” and “are considering fresh capital injection (…) to develop Solvia as our spin-off “. (…).

Growing interest in Spanish property also has been expressed by gambling on newly listed Socimis and BBVA´s Anida, put up for sale few days ago.

Moreover, Sabadell´s managing board is weighting up inviting David Martínez to join the team. The Mexican businessman supported the bank several times when it came to capital enlargement. Sabadell considers investing in Mexico as well (…).

 

 

Original article: Cinco Días (Juande Portillo)

Translation: AURA REE

Sabadell Improves Real Estate Offer

19/02/2014 – Dirigentes Digital

Real estate branch of Banco Sabadell, Solvia, is going to extend its marketers´network that presently consociates 49 experts. The company is planning incorporation of 60 new agents and introducing a personal advisor post whose job will be informing and matching clients with the property best fitting their profile requirements, among the 17.500 properties owned by the real estate.

The recruitment for the opened posts is carried out via the real estate company´s webpage, www.solvia.es, by the end of the first quarter of the year. (…).

Sabadell has taken the decision in order to improve the sales structure of its real estate lot, amplify it and offer all over Spain, especially in Catalonia, in the northern and central Spain, Andalusia and the Canary Islands in cooperation with external network of over 1.000 specialist firms.

(…) Sabadell and Solvia will also apply 25% discounts in terms of financing.

 

Original article: Dirigentes Digital (Arturo Blanco)

Translation: AURA REE

Sabadell to Invest 150 Million Euros & Construct 1.182 Houses Within Demand Upturn Areas

Banco Sabadell does not want to miss the business opportunity detected within the vast awarded land portfolio it disposes of all over the country. Despite the huge number of flats it still shall sell, the entity has decided to run 44 developments on its property plots situated in the areas with sufficient demand (…).

In total, the 44 developments will lay the foundation for 1.182 houses fueled by an amount of 150 million Euros. All the developments will be carried out by the bank itself, through its real estate company Solvia.

The dwellings will be built on the plots located in urban areas and districts with clear demand (…) and in the cities where the housing prices per square meter has been consecutively climbing up in last 2-3 quarters, such as Cerdanyola del Vallès, Calvià (Majorca) and Murcia.

Source: Expansión

Sabadell is thinking of selling the real estate company Solvia

Banco Sabadell would like to contribute to the value of its real estate company Solvia. The institution has started to probe the market and is studying a possible sale of the company, as admitted by Jaume Guardiola, managing director.

In view of the interest the Spanish real estate sector is awakening among the great international funds, Banco Sabadell has decided to study the sale of Solvia, a company that has been able to commercialize 12615 properties this year. “We are considering the sale in view of the interest there is in the market”, Jaume Guardiola has declared during the presentation of the quarterly results of the bank. “It is only an analysis, we might do it or not”, he has pointed out, after stressing that Solvia is currently “a central point” within the bank. “It is the instrument we have to evacuate assets; it runs like clockwork and it has an outstanding team and productivity”, he has declared.

The managing director of Sabadell has clarified that a potential sale of Solvia would only be based on “taking advantage of a market opportunity” and not because the bank needs capital.

Catalunya Banc and Bankia have already sold their platforms for the sale and asset management this year. (…) Between January and September, Banco Sabadell has sold 63% more assets, a total of 12615 units, with earnings of 1909 million Euros, an increase of 55% over the previous year. The target for the whole year was to get rid of 16000 properties for more than 2600 million Euros.

According to Guardiola, “Sabadell is the bank with the least exposure to the real estate sector in the Spanish financial sector. (…)