Ralph Winter and Thomas Landschreiber, founders of pan-European asset manager Corestate Capital, have teamed up again to launch a new boutique investment firm.
Named 777 Capital Partners, the new property platform will focus on the DACH region (Germany, Austria and Switzerland) targeting off-market investment opportunities with value-added and opportunistic return profiles in the residential and commercial real estate sectors. The company, based in Baar-Zug (Switzerland), will focus on new developments, ‘to create long-term value and sustainably upgrade the neighbourhoods’.
‘The corona crisis will put many market participants under severe pressure in the next one to two years. In addition, under the new macroeconomic situation and the Basel III/IV reforms, banks will be much stricter in granting new financing. We expect a great deal of restructuring on the equity and debt side,’ said Landschreiber, commenting on the market environment. ‘We already experienced this in 2009 and it is only a matter of time before the new circumstances lead to a number of interesting investment opportunities.’
Landschreiber and Winter go back a long way together. Years ago, they built up the real estate business of Cerberus Capital in Germany and in 2006 founded investment manager Corestate Capital, which has since grown to become one of the largest real estate investment managers in Europe. Winter is still the largest individual shareholder at the company that went public on the Frankfurt stock exchange on 4 October, 2016.
Winter has lived in the US for the past four years where, with his Family Office W5, he focuses on the innovative residential real estate sector with a growing portfolio in metropolitan areas and selected regions. W5 hit the headlines two years ago when it announced the expansion of its ‘Innovative Living’ portfolio with the injection of $500 mln (€452 mln) in capital and the subsequent investment of more than 500 beds in Washington, DC.
Another founding member and chairman of 777 is Micha Blattmann, formerly the supervisory board chairman of Corestate Capital. He is a co-founder of Vicenda Asset Management, an investment boutique focusing on alternative financing and private debt. He is also a member of the board of directors of M&G International Switzerland.
Commenting on the new venture, Winter, who chairs the investment committee of 777 Capital Partners, said: ‘Especially in challenging times, it is important to have access to the right market participants and the appropriate capital. We are able to take risks with our own capital - something like this has become very rare today.'
He continued: 'Our extensive network of investors and sellers know that we can execute challenging transactions. I am very pleased that with such a strong team we are able to focus on the essential, namely on commercially sustainable and successful investments for our investment partners. The operational influence in the residential real estate market is currently growing exponentially, a development that is already more noticeable in the USA. Innovative Living assets with community approaches will be highly successful in the coming decades. This opens up a broad spectrum of investment opportunities, ranging from debt capital to equity and PropTech private equity.’
