Singapore-headquartererd Mapletree Investments is investing £1bn (€1.17bn) to acquire student housing assets across Germany and the UK, along with an operating platform, from Cuscaden Peak Investments.
The portfolio includes 8,192 operational beds across 19 cities, making Mapletree one of the largest owners of UK student housing with more than 17,000 beds in the country.
Cuscaden Peak Investments is a wholly owned subsidiary of Cuscaden Peak, of which Mapletree Investments is a shareholder alongside Singapore-listed Hotel Properties Limited and CLA Real Estate Holdings, a subsidiary of sovereign wealth fund Temasek.
The newly acquired assets are located in university cities, including Bristol, Cambridge, Durham, Edinburgh, Oxford and York in the UK, and Bremen in Germany. The operating platform manages two brands, Student Castle and Capitol Students.
Since entering the market in 2016, Mapletree has grown its student housing portfolio to 33,000 beds across 47 cities in the UK, US, Germany and Canada, with total assets under management of S$6.2bn (€4.27bn).
Hiew Yoon Khong, group CEO of Mapletree, said: “The acquisition is part of Mapletree’s strategy to grow the student accommodation sector in the UK, the US, Europe and Australia, which remain under-served by quality student housing assets.
“The student housing sector is one of the group’s core real estate focus areas due to its fundamental demand-supply imbalance and defensive characteristics. We will capitalise on the newly acquired operating platform to support our strategic vision of growing as well as enhancing our operational performance in the UK.”
