The Teacher Retirement System of Texas is upping its investment in European hotels and global infrastructure.
The pension plan has approved commitments of $50m (€37m) and $40m to the Starwood Capital’s UK Hotels Co-Invest fund and the Meadow Real Estate Partners’ Fund III.
Commitments of $250m and $100m were made to Morgan Stanley’s Infrastructure II and Infrastructure Sidecar II funds.
Morgan Stanley declined to comment.
The manager invests in infrastructure in North America, Europe and Asia, buying transport, energy and utilities, communication and social infrastructure.
Texas Teachers made the commitments as part of $565m worth of real asset commitments in June.
Texas also made a $100m commitment to Grosvenor’s 2014-2 RE Investment Series, a fund of funds investment vehicle, as well as a $25m allocation to the Savanna Real Estate Fund III, a value-added office building fund that focuses on New York City.
Texas Teachers will co-invest in an existing London hotel portfolio Starwood bought earlier this year. The 23 hotels are part of the De Vere Venues portfolio, which Starwood paid €231m for in March.
Texas Teachers said its commitment covers roughly 17% of the Starwood UK Hotels Co-Invest vehicle.
Meadow Fund III, meanwhile, is buying assets in London and New York with an opportunistic investment strategy. With no assets at present, the fund is focusing on underperforming office, retail, apartment and hotel properties.
The fund will be targeting smaller deals with equity contributions in the range of $10m to $30m.
The fund, which had its first closing with $300m of commitments, is hoping for a total equity raise of $400m, with a hard cap of $500m and a final closing by year end.
The fund has targeted 20% IRR, with Meadow Partners co-investing 1% in the fund.
Leverage placed on the fund will be 60-65%.
