Spanish debt-loaded property company Habitat admitted in a note to its creditor banks this week that it won't be able to meet debt payments due by the end of 2008, Spanish paper El Pais reported on Friday. The company, whose acquisition of Ferrovial's real estate division in 2007 was fuelled with debt, said that it can’t meet payments of EUR 35 mln part of a EUR 1.6 bn refinancing agreement sealed seven months ago. The paper said that the company will meet creditor banks to try to avoid filing for administration.
Spanish debt-loaded property company Habitat admitted in a note to its creditor banks this week that it won't be able to meet debt payments due by the end of 2008, Spanish paper El Pais reported on Friday. The company, whose acquisition of Ferrovial's real estate division in 2007 was fuelled with debt, said that it can’t meet payments of EUR 35 mln part of a EUR 1.6 bn refinancing agreement sealed seven months ago. The paper said that the company will meet creditor banks to try to avoid filing for administration.
The company, which is active in Spain, Portugal, Hungary, and Latin America, has lost EUR 650 mln in the first half of the year mostly because of devaluation of its property assets. Habitat has now hired investment bank Rothschild to look at possibilities to raise equity by opening its capital to other investors, the paper said.
The company is 20%-owned by Ferrovial, owner of the British airports operator BAA.
