Nido Living, the European student accommodation platform backed by Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, is pushing the pedal on a €1bn investment programme in the Italian student housing market with a number of potential deals currently in the works.
Carlo Matta, CEO of Nido Living, said Nido, which recently entered Italy with the purchase of the Unionezero student housing development in Milan, expects to seal new acquisitions in a number of cities in the coming months.
“Our primary focus is on cities with top-ranked universities, robust demand from both domestic and international students, and an acute undersupply of PBSA [purpose-built student accommodation],” he told to IPE Real Assets. “Currently, top-priority Italian cities include Milan, Rome, Turin, Bologna, Padua, Florence and Naples – each showing strong fundamentals in terms of student population growth and provision gap.”
The Milan deal – which is rumoured to amount to roughly €100m – was structured as the forward purchase of 600-plus beds with a fund managed by Prelios SGR and backed by Hines as developer and co-investor. Completion is scheduled for mid-2027.
“We remain open to a range of deal structures, including developments and acquisitions, depending on the market. However, forward deals currently represent the majority of our planned capital deployment in Italy and Germany due to their higher adjusted return potential,” Matta said.
According to Matta, Milan was at the top of the group’s investment priorities due to its status as one of Italy’s largest university cities and one of the most under-supplied PBSA markets in Europe. “Our ambition is to become a dominant PBSA operator in Italy by delivering the best-in-class products and services students have enjoyed in other more mature markets,” he said.
Rents are growing faster in Italy than in most European countries, with research from Colliers pointing to rental growth of 12% in 2024, compared to a European average of 5.2% in the same year.
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