Rest Super and Barings have bought a portfolio of 12 logistics assets in Australia from Goodman Group for around A$780m (€478m).
The portfolio comes with some 70ha of underlying land and approximately 340,000sqm of total leasable areas across Sydney and Melbourne. It includes the largest wholesale distribution centre in Australia – a 115,000 sqm mega shed in Melbourne’s west for distribution company Metcash.
Andrew Lill, Rest’s CIO, said: “After investing successfully in the US industrial property sector and committing to a venture targeting the UK and Europe, we’re pleased to now increase our presence in the Australian market where there is continued strong demand for industrial property.
“We’re confident about our plan to continue investment in industrial property with Barings. We believe there’s value in purchasing well-located industrial assets and we expect rents to increase materially over time.”
Shaun Hannah, executive director, real estate at Barings said: “The acquisition of this portfolio reflects Barings’ positive outlook for the industrial sector in Australia and aligns with our investment strategy of targeting to buy existing leased buildings with significant underlying land value at attractive pricing.
“The newer, larger, longer leased assets are more likely to provide stable defensive cashflows and the shorter lease Sydney infill assets unlock the opportunity to improve the ESG features and capture rental reversion.”
The assets were sourced off-market, and James King, director of investment management at Barings told IPE Real Assets that the final portfolio was expanded and refined during the process. “The Sydney assets offered value add opportunities including identified expansion, redevelopment and re-leasing opportunities.”
Barings and Australian superannuation fund Rest Super formed a joint venture last November and committed to build out an industrial portfolio of more than A$1bn.
The partnership’s first industrial asset was acquired from Charter Hall for A$96.1m. With the latest transaction, the partnership has acquired assets totalling close to A$900m.
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