Austrian real estate group Immofinanz said on Tuesday that it has finalised the largest German real estate transaction so far in 2009 with the sale of two office buildings and a five-star-plus hotel in Munich's Lenbachgärten.
Austrian real estate group Immofinanz said on Tuesday that it has finalised the largest German real estate transaction so far in 2009 with the sale of two office buildings and a five-star-plus hotel in Munich's Lenbachgärten.
Immofinanz said the 65,000m2 Munich city centre property deal was based on a real estate value of more than EUR 200 mln. Both office buildings are fully let.
The property was purchased by Munich-based family office AM alpha, which carries out real estate investments for several affluent German families.
The sale is part of Immofinanz's strategy to stabilise its balance sheet. The company posted a EUR 2 bn loss in 2008, largely due to writedowns at its CEE subsidiary Immoeast.
Immofinanz came close to collapsing due to a combination of the global downturn and the mismanagement of the executive board then in place. Founder and CEO Karl Petrikovics stepped down in October last year and was replaced by a new board.
The Immofinanz group said earlier this year that it is now in better shape, having slashed its EUR 6.9 bn development pipeline in Central and Eastern Europe by half and having sold EUR 500 mln of assets prior to the latest disposal.
Commenting on the Lenbachgärten transaction, Immofinanz CEO Dr Eduard Zehetner said, 'After careful deliberation we opted to dispose of these objects. We are respectably optimising our cash flow in the company on the one hand, and on the other hand the transaction demonstrates that Immofinanz operates with valuable assets and is also able to sell properties in a difficult market.'
