NORTH AMERICA – The New York State Teachers Retirement System (NYSTRS) has made $157.5m (€116m) worth of new commitments to real estate.
One of these was a $50m allocation to Cerberus Institutional Real Estate Partners III.
According to an email from the pension fund, the commingled fund is targeting a 17-20% gross IRR for the limited partners in the fund.
Cerberus Capital Management is the manager of the fund, which has a targeted capital raise of $1bn.
The fund is being marketed as an opportunity fund, investing primarily in Europe and the US.
This will target distressed mortgage-backed securities in the US and European non-performing loans.
NYSTRS previously invested with the manager to the tune of $50m each to Cerberus Real Estate Partners I and II.
The pension fund also made a $75m commitment into preferred REITs made through Cohen & Steers Capital Management.
The pension fund cited the manager's ability to draw down capital where it believed there were good investment opportunities in the market.
The fund invests in preferred REITs that own shares in publicly traded companies based in the US.
NYSTRS made additional commitments to two private real estate operating companies in which it has ownership positions.
It made a $12.5m commitment into the Donahue Schriber Realty Group and $20m into the Edens Investment Trust.
Both companies focus on US shopping centres, the former owning assets mostly on the West Coast, the latter on the East Coast.
The pension fund has made investments in both of these companies for an extended period.
It first invested ($365m) in Donahue Schriber in January of 1997.
The scheme has been placing capital into Edens since September of 2000, and its investment has a current value of $563m.
