US private equity group Cerberus Capital Management has made its first foray into the Italian real estate market with the signing of two high-profile acquisitions worth over €180 mln, PropertyEU has learned.

US private equity group Cerberus Capital Management has made its first foray into the Italian real estate market with the signing of two high-profile acquisitions worth over €180 mln, PropertyEU has learned.

New York-based Cerberus has emerged as the buyer of the Calvino portfolio of six office buildings being sold by Idea Fimit's Atlantic 2-Berenice closed-end fund in liquidation.

The assets, located in the cities of Turin, Ivrea, Rome, Milan, Assago and Agrate Brianza, were sold at a 12% discount to their latest appraised value at end-June 2014.

PropertyEU reported back in March that fund manager Idea Fimit was looking for a buyer for a sub-portfolio of assets owned by Atlantic 2-Berenice.

PATRIMONIO DEAL
In its second purchase in a week, Cerberus also emerged as the buyer of a portfolio of seven office buildings and barracks held by the Patrimonio Uno closed-end fund managed by BNP Paribas REIM Sgr.

Cerberus, which is making the purchase through the C1 Investment Fund managed by Cordea Savills Sgr, has bought an initial portfolio of four assets in Senigallia, Pescara, Padoa and Mestre for some €40 mln. By year-end, the private equity giant will also acquire a further three assets in Florence, Vicenza and Genoa for another €50 mln. In total, the properties provide some 85,000 m2 and are let entirely to the Police and the Customs Agency on long-term rental agreements.

Patrimonio Uno, which is due to be liquidated by year-end 2017, was established in 2005 through the transfer of 75 state-owned assets in a major operation backed by the Ministry of Economy and Finance. The fund is currently entirely owned by institutional investors and owns assets fully let to the Italian state.

CBRE advised the vendor on both deals.

'After Blackstone, these deals mark the entry in Italy of another important foreign investor,' commented Paolo Bellacosa, managing director of capital markets at CBRE Italy. 'These deals are a good sign for the market but we should not forget that the pricing suffers from the macroeconomic conditions in our country which remain difficult,' he noted, adding that sellers should remain extremely cautious in the coming months.

FUNDS IN LIQUIDATION
A number of closed-end funds approaching maturity are looking to liquidate assets now that capital is gradually coming back to the long-moribund Italian property market.

Rome-based asset manager Beni Stabili Gestioni Sgr had been trying to sell a value-add portfolio of five office and logistics properties but eventually decided to put the sale on hold after receiving offers it deemed were too low.

The Klimt portfolio is owned by the group’s Italian Real Estate Fund (IREF), a closed-end fund for institutional investors with a maturity date of year-end 2015.

WEIGHT OF CAPITAL
Ron Rawald, head of European real estate for US private equity firm Cerberus, told a recent PropertyEU Investment Briefing on Italy that new investment in the country is being driven solely by weight of capital. The strong foreign interest is ‘based on weight of capital and not on fundamentals and that makes me the most concerned about the market’, he said.

Click here to listen to Ran Rawald's views on the Italian market