GERMANY – Five unnamed first-pillar pension funds in Northern Germany have awarded Warburg-Henderson KAG a €200m home-biased real estate Spezialfonds mandate.

For the Immobilien-Fonds Norddeutscher Versorgungswerke, the five pension funds will initially invest €100m, but its size is set to grow to €200m over time.

No further information was available on the five Versorgungswerke.

The fund is to invest solely in Northern Germany, focusing on Hamburg and the office and retail sectors, operator-run properties and special use assets.

While Warburg-Henderson is in charge of the investment process, its partner HIH Hamburgische Immobilien Handlung is taking on asset and transaction management for the Spezialfonds.

Eitel Coridaß, chief executive at Warburg-Henderson, said: “More and more institutional investors are looking for fund solutions based on aligned interests of investors making it possible to efficiently implement the investment and payout strategy.”

He added that having a “small circle of investors also made strategy adjustment easier” – when external factors changed, for example.

In recent years, an increasing number of Versorgungswerke and other pension funds have joined forces to access larger infrastructure and real estate deals.