Blackstone has bought a ¥110bn (€869m) real estate portfolio in Japan from Asia-focussed fund manager PAG.
PAG acquired most of the portfolio from General Electric in 2015 for US$1bn (€819.5m) and the current portfolio includes office buildings, commercial facilities and rental condominiums located mostly in Tokyo and Osaka.
Blackstone, which declined a request for comment, has been one of the most active acquisitors in Japan this year, having bookended the year with two major transactions.
In January, the private equity firm bought back some 220 residential apartment blocks from China’s Anbang for ¥300bn. In July, it acquired four logistics assets from Daiwa House Industry for ¥55bn.
A source told IPE Real Assets that Blackstone agreed last month to buy the apartment leasing business of a department store operator, Isetan Mitsukoshi Holdings, in a deal said to be worth about ¥30bn.
Blackstone is expected to apply its “buy it, fix it, sell it” strategy to the latest Japanese acquisition.
However, it is thought that it could choose to hold some of the assets longer, to take advantage of rental growth in core markets in Japanese cities.
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