Fidelity International has acqquired a recently built logistics facility near Paris on behalf of the Eurozone Select Real Estate Fund (FIREF) from Barings.
Financial details were not disclosed.
The sale by Barings marks the second disposal in France on behalf of Barings’ pan-European logistics joint venture (PELV), closely following that of an asset in Béziers in the south of the country near the Spanish border.
Barings acquired the asset in Saint-Ouen l’Aumône, a suburb to the north west of Paris, in December 2020 with the intention of redeveloping the existing building into a 23,760 m2 logistics platform that was 50% pre-let.
Despite the pandemic, construction was completed in September 2021 at which point it was already 85% pre-let. Barings fully let the property to four tenants by mid-2022 and marketed the property with the help of BNP Paribas and CBRE.
Guillaume Bieganski, managing director and head of French real estate at Barings, said: 'Having carried out our strategic asset management initiatives to redevelop this asset into a Grade A space, we are disposing of the building in line with our business plan.
'The logistics market in France remains an attractive one for Barings given the fundamentals of the sector, and we’re continuing to explore opportunities in logistics as well as our other preferred sectors of residential and prime offices in city centre locations.'
The asset is located in Greater Paris, within a top logistics hub in the French capital, and is 25 km from the Paris ring road and 40km from Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport. The asset features a net lettable area of 23,760 m2 of Grade A logistics space, including two cold negative and positive storage cells. The asset has achieved a BREEAM Good certification.
PELV is a joint venture between a US insurance firm and a Middle Eastern sovereign wealth fund, deploying its capital into diversified core-plus to value-add logistics property in prime European markets.
Barings was advised by BNP Paribas on the sale.
