Aviva Investors, the global asset management business of Aviva, has acquired a portfolio of care home developments in the UK from Frontier Estates for £71 mln (€81 mln).
The purchase was made on behalf of Aviva's Lime Property Fund and is structured as a forward funding transaction over the next two years.
The assets will be let to One Housing for 30 years upon completion and will be run as private-pay facilities under One Housing’s Baycroft brand.
They are located in Bedford, Letchworth, Flitwick and Watford and will include 308 beds of purpose-built, high-quality care home provision.
The transaction follows the Lime fund's recent investment in a modern office building in Bristol, pre-let on a 15-year lease to Babcock Integrated Technology.
Colliers International advised Frontier Estates, Savills advised Aviva Investors.
'We have a strong pipeline of ongoing opportunities that will support our efforts to grow the platform,' said Mark Wells, Origination Manager, Aviva Investors.
Duncan Ford, head of Healthcare at Frontier Estates, said: 'With some analysts predicting the UK will need around 70,000 new care home bed spaces during the next five to seven years alone, we will continue to use our unrivalled site acquisition programme and 15 years’ experience of working in the sector to help our care home operating partners scale-up their expansion plans in the right locations for them.'
Lime Property Fund is a secure income long lease property fund managed by Aviva Investors with over £2 bn of net asset value. The fund, launched in 2004, targets property investments let to strong tenants on leases with inflation-linked or fixed-rental uplifts and lease terms of 15 years plus.
