A European value-add fund managed by Invesco’s real estate investment arm has invested an undisclosed sum to buy a UK retail warehouse park.
Invesco Real Estate’s European Value-Add Fund II (EVAF II) has acquired The Fort Shopping Park in partnership with George Capital, from a consortium of investors including Nuveen Real Estate, CBRE Global Investors, Aberdeen Standard Investments and M&G Real Estate.
The Fort is located on a 29-acre site in Birmingham and provides over 300,000sqft of retail space. The Fort is let to tenants including Primark, Next, Sports Direct, Superdrug, Boots, JD Sports and Wilko.
Miles Skinner, director - UK transactions at Invesco Real Estate, said: “The UK retail warehouse park market has remained resilient despite the challenges of the last 18 months and we are delighted to partner with George Capital to acquire The Fort, which offers excellent repositioning opportunities in conjunction with very strong underlying real estate fundamentals.
“The asset fits with our strategy to seek out well-located opportunities with value creation prospects, which will allow us to introduce diversification of occupier in a changing retail world and to implement enhanced ESG initiatives in order to drive performance for our investors.”
The acquisition is the seventh for EVAF II, a discretionary vehicle with €1.4bn of purchase capacity.
Ben Young, founder of George Capital, said: “There are a number of opportunities for us to add value through active asset management of the existing retail units and to explore alternative uses, particularly in fulfilment and logistics, for part of the site.”
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