Catella Residential Investment Management’s (CRIM) newly-launched pan-European fund has received a €40m commitment from French fund manager Primonial REIM.

The commitment from Primonial REIM is the fund’s first commitment from outside Germany.

CRIM said the open-ended Catella European Residential Fund III (CER III) fund, which had its first close in July, is targeting at least €1bn in investments across European residential real estate markets.

The properties targeted for the fund are modern and affordable apartments with stable cash flow, including new developments, investments can also be made in modern living market segments such as senior living, student housing and serviced apartments.

The manager said CER III has an investment pipeline of more than €250m in markets including Denmark, the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany and France.

The fund’s first €42m acquisition in June was of 83 apartments at Fillippahaven in the Valby district of Copenhagen.

Michael Fink, managing director, Catella Residential Investment Management, said the CER III fund’s Luxembourg-based structure provides international investors with easy access to Catella’s residential investment platform, the largest and most geographically diverse across European markets.

“We anticipate that we will be able to announce further new investors alongside Primonial REIM in the near future.

”There is extremely strong investor demand for the fast-growing and defensive ‘living sector’ of real estate assets in a world of very low, or negative, investment yields, particularly in fixed- income products.”

Casper van Grieken, head of equity placement at CBRE Netherlands, which acted as placement agent for the CER III fund, said: “To have achieved a first fundraise in such a short space of time is testament to the quality and track record of the Catella platform.

“With a compelling pipeline and strong ability to source attractive investments across Europe, this strength of offering has not been seen in the market for some time.”