Healthscope, the Australian private hospital operator, is planning to establish an AUD1bn (€633.4m) real estate trust with a capital partner.

Healthscope would own a majority interest in the hospital property trust and a new co-investor would be introduced to hold an interest of up to 49%.

The listed company in May rejected three separate takeover offers from parties including Northwest REIT, an AustraliaSuper-backed consortium and Brookfield.

Healthscope then began a strategic review on the future of its AUD$1.3bn healthcare real estate portfolio. It owns 43 private hospitals in Australia and pathology operations across New Zealand.

Now complete, this review has identified an opportunity to realise value from Healthscope’s hospital property assets.

The proposed property trust would hold the majority of Healthscope’s freehold hospital property assets and lease them back to Healthscope.

The company said hospital properties expected to be transferred into the property trust (and leased back to Healthscope) had a book value for land and buildings of around AUD1bn.

Healthscope would expect its capital partner to help fund part of Healthscope’s future brownfield projects.

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