US real estate investor Amstar and Turkey's Renaissance Development said that their Kozzy shopping centre has opened its doors in the Kadikoy district of Istanbul. The project, which is owned on a 50/50 basis by Amstar and Renaissance, is the joint venture's first in Turkey and represents an investment of around EUR 30 mln.

US real estate investor Amstar and Turkey's Renaissance Development said that their Kozzy shopping centre has opened its doors in the Kadikoy district of Istanbul. The project, which is owned on a 50/50 basis by Amstar and Renaissance, is the joint venture's first in Turkey and represents an investment of around EUR 30 mln.

'We have quite a large pipeline of future projects with Renaissance in Russia and Turkey, where we believe that demographic growth and increasing demand for institutional-quality real estate in under-supplied markets will underpin the development of the commercial real estate market', Jason Lucas, senior vice president at Amstar, told PropertyEU.

Amstar, which first came to Europe in 2007 with its $335 mln emerging markets fund, Amstar Global Property Fund I, is also partnering with Renaissance in the development of a 60,000 m2 shopping centre in Adana, which is due to open its doors in March 2011. In Russia, the joint partners are developing a 60,000 m2 mall in Novosibirsk, Russia's third largest city.

The scheme in Istanbul offers 60 shops, a nine-screen cinema, indoor and outdoor restaurants and cafes as well as 260 underground parking spaces. At grand opening, the 15,000-m2 mall was 100%-leased. Amstar in partnership with Renaissance developed and leased the project, whose construction began in 2008. The development team partnered with the Kadikoy municipality to secure a ground lease of the city's land in exchange for an office and theatre component reserved for the municipality's use.

Lucas said the partners will be retaining the centre for the moment but might look into a sale if capital markets continue to improve.

Established in 1987, Amstar is a real estate investment manager with over $1.65 bn of assets under management in the US, Europe and Latin America.