La Française Forum Real Estate Partners is launching its first new real estate fund following its creation at the start of the year.
LFF Real Estate Partners, established after La Française and Forum Partners bought Cushman & Wakefield Investors, hopes to build a £500m (€641m) UK shopping centre fund over a three-year period.
The fund manager will work with retail asset management company Realm on the fund.
LFF Real Estate Partners already co-manages a European retail fund with Aberdeen Asset Management – the Pan European Retail Fund (PURetail) was originally a joint venture between Cushman & Wakefield Investors and Scottish Widows Investment Partnership, which is now part of Aberdeen.
Earlier this year, La Française CEO Philippe Lecomte told IP Real Estate that the company was exploring options to launch new institutional products, including those focused on the retail markets.
The new fund will invest in core-plus shopping centres in the UK and target lot sizes of between £35m and £100m.
LFF Real Estate Partners have brought in the help of Realm, which manages more than 2.5m sqft of retail and leisure assets in the UK, mainly for institutional investors.
David Rendall, CEO of LFF Real Estate Partners, said shopping centres required “specialist management”.
