AEW, Texas pension fund buy massive mall in the UK

Fund manager AEW Europe has acquired Festival Place in Basingstoke, a 192,190 m2 shopping centre in Hampshire, UK, from TH Real Estate.

The acquisition was on behalf of a partnership between AEW Europe and the Teacher Retirement System of Texas. The financial details were not disclosed.

Festival Place is a dominant town centre scheme with anchor tenants including Debenhams and Marks and Spencer, and a 10-screen Vue multiplex cinema and around 20 restaurants.

AEW Europe plans to undertake a number of asset management initiatives and strategic capital expenditure to improve the tenant mix and further enhance the shopping experience.

AEW Europe have been steadily building their retail assets under management during the course of this year, having acquired both prime and value-add retail assets, including Sutton shopping centre and the Celsius portfolio, in recent months.

Russell Jewell, head of private equity funds at AEW Europe commented: 'Festival Place dominates Basingstoke town centre and we will seek to add value by reconfiguring the existing space and further improve the tenant mix. With occupancy currently standing at just over 92%, there is also room to improve the income profile of the asset.'

'Our intention now is to reinvest this capital during the first half of 2016, focussing on core, dominant assets across all sub sectors of retail in both the UK and Continental Europe,' added David Turner, head of European investment at TH Real Estate.

Lunson-Mitchenall and Mayer Brown acted for AEW Europe, while TH Real Estate was represented by CBRE.