Internos in EUR 44m hotel sale-and-leaseback with Accor

Internos Real Investors has bought two MGallery-branded hotels in a sale-and-leaseback transaction with international hospitality group Accor.

The 207-room MGallery Mondial Am Dom in Cologne was acquired for EUR 20.5 mln, while the 148-room MGallery The Convent Hotel in Amsterdam was bought for EUR 23.5 mln.

Both hotels will continue to be operated by Accor through a 15-year commercial lease agreement that will be renewable at Accor's option. The turnover rent averages 21.5% of the annual revenue of the hotels. 'This new transaction confirms the group's ability to continue to actively manage its assets, in line with its asset management strategy of reducing adjusted net debt by EUR 2.2 bn by 2015,' Accor said in a statement.

The assets were bought on behalf of Internos' Hotel Real Estate Fund. Structured as a German spezialfonds for institutional investors, the fund held its first close in July, having secured initial equity of EUR 75 mln from four German institutional investors.

Announcing the first close, Internos said in July that it had exchanged contracts for the purchase of its seed portfolio comprising four hotels with a total investment of over EUR 100 mln, with related debt provided by Bayern LB.

The hotels are 3-4-star hotels with a long trading record, located in major cities in Germany and the Netherlands and operated by three different major hotel groups under long leases, Internos said. The MGallery hotels in Cologne and Amsterdam are two of the four hotels in the seed portfolio.