German real estate debt specialist EOS Immobilienworkout has acquired a single non-performing loan (NPL) of €36.9 mln secured by a shopping centre in the Netherlands.

NPL deal

NPL Deal

Engel & Völkers Investment Consulting (EVIC) brokered the sale, advising the vendor and securing the buyer.

'The deal is the first cross-border NPL transaction we have supported and required us to leverage our international network,' said Thorsten Brogt, board member for distressed debt/real estate opportunity funds at EVIC.

'The transaction marks our entry into the international NPL market, which will help us continue our expansion. We expect a significant number of NPL transactions in 2019, particularly in Southern Europe, along with continuing high transaction volumes in Ireland and the United Kingdom,' Brogt added.

For EOS, the transaction marks its first acquisition of real estate secured NPL debt in the Netherlands.

'We have been watching the Dutch market for a while now and are happy to have achieved market entry by making the acquisition,' said Jochen Prinz, managing director of EOS Immobilienworkout.

'We have years of experience in handling distressed, real estate secured debt. Plus our home base in Mülheim an der Ruhr gives us a clear geographic advantage for the Dutch market,' Prinz added.

EVIC extended its business model in early 2016 to include NPL debt and has since been expanding in this field, according to the real estate services firm.