AXA Investment Managers - Real Assets has created an affordable housing investment partnership with a subsidiary French social housing firm Action Logement.

The €100bn real assets manager has formed the venture with In’li with the acquisition of a 75% stake in a newly created property company with an initial portfolio of 143 assets.

In’li will retain the remaining 25% stake in the new company which has a portfolio of 9,800 residential units spread across the whole of Île-de-France.

AXA IM - Real Assets said the partnership intends to develop a further 1,500 new units per year.

As part of the partnership, In’li will source new forward funding development opportunities as well as undertake project management, property management and leasing for the venture, while AXA IM - Real Assets will be responsible for asset and fund management.

The acquisition forms part of AXA IM - Real Assets’ strategy, on behalf of clients, to invest in residential asset classes and adds to its €22bn portfolio of residential assets spread across 15 countries.

Isabelle Scemama, CEO of AXA IM - Real Assets, said: “As a European leader in real estate asset management, we have been implementing an ambitious residential investment strategy for several years, focusing on markets where there is significant need and favouring intermediate segments in order to provide affordable housing for local populations.”

Benoist Apparu, chairman of In’li, said: “This long-term partnership with AXA IM - Real Assets is an opportunity for the development of intermediate housing in the Paris region.

”It will contribute to the production, through the property company or directly, of 80,000 new intermediary housing units over the next 10 years – an ambitious objective that in’li has set itself since its creation.”

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