Singapore’s Ascendas Reit has moved into the UK logistics market with the acquisition of a £207m (€232.9m) portfolio of assets from Oxenwood Real Estate.
Oxenwood Real Estate, in a joint venture with Catalina Holdings, said it has agreed to sell the 12 logistics properties, totalling 2.61m square foot, to Ascendas Reit.
The assets are located in Biggleswade, Rotherham, Runcorn, Stoke-on-Trent, Sheffield, Burton-upon-Trent, Heywood, Scunthorpe, Eastleigh, Newport Pagnell and two sites in South Normanton.
Ascendas Management UK will provide Ascendas Reit with certain asset management services and other related services in respect of the properties.
William Tay, an executive director and CEO of Ascendas Funds Management, the manager of Ascendas Reit, said: “The investment presents an attractive and meaningful entry into the UK market.
“The portfolio has a long weighted average lease expiry of 14.6 years and is largely comprised of freehold land. These are appealing attributes that will strengthen our existing portfolio.”
As at the first quarter of this year, Ascendas Reit’s SGD$10.4bn (€6.52bn) of managed assets, comprised 100 properties in Singapore and 31 properties in Australia.
Oxenwood said the proceeds from the sale will be recycled and reinvested in further opportunistic purchases.
Founded in 2014, the multi-sector opportunistic investor has predominately focused on the UK and continental Europe logistics sectors. It retains around £350m of logistics assets in the UK and Germany in joint ventures.
Jeremy Bishop, the co-founder of Oxenwood, said: “This disposal demonstrates our willingness to exit assets as they mature and provides around £100m of equity for reinvestment by the Oxenwood Catalina joint venture into more active opportunities.
“It has generated an excellent return for the joint venture thanks to the timing of the acquisitions of the assets and the application of our asset management skills to regear and extend leases.”
Stewart Little, a co-founder of Oxenwood, said: “Catalina was our very first meeting and our very first investor when we launched in May 2014. The sale of the portfolio represents an excellent outcome and important landmark for the joint venture.
”Importantly, we are already in advanced discussions on a number of opportunities as we look to recycle the capital returned.”
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