German listed property company GSW Immobilien and its former owner Whitehall Funds have reportedly launched a EUR 1 bn bid for the Baubecon portfolio of residential units owned by UK lender Barclays.
German listed property company GSW Immobilien and its former owner Whitehall Funds have reportedly launched a EUR 1 bn bid for the Baubecon portfolio of residential units owned by UK lender Barclays.
The Financial Times Deutschland reported on Thursday that GSW and Whitehall are in the running to buy the 21,000 apartments located in Berlin, Hanover, Magdeburg and Braunschweig. Peer firm Deutsche Wohnen is also said to be eyeing the assets.
'We intend to grow, which is why we carried out a EUR 200 mln capital increase last week,' a GSW spokesperson told PropertyEU on Thursday. 'We are looking at all the portfolios of a size of 20-25,000 units which are on the market in Germany. However, we cannot comment on single transactions,' he added.
According to the FTD report, GSW is only interested in 7,000 Berlin-based flats, while Whitehall plans to take over the rest of the apartments.
Baubecon fell into Barclays' hands at the end of 2011 when its former owners, RREEF and Prelios, were unable to repay the loan on the asset. The portfolio was valued at around EUR 1.8 bn at the peak of the market in 2007.
