Q3 DEALS: Dutch deals on course to equal €10b record

The Dutch real estate investment market is on course to equal the record volume of €10 bn achieved in 2014.

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TOP DUTCH DEALS
First nine months of 2015

1. Wereldhave completes €770m Dutch mall portfolio buy
2. Accor divests 29 German and Dutch hotels in €234m leaseback deal
3. Bouwinvest Invests over €305 Million in Dutch Residential Assets
4. Tristan confirms €212m Dutch buy, plans more deals in the Netherlands
5. Shurgard buys Dutch storage chain City Box for over €110m
6. Vastned spends €108m on Amsterdam's premier high-street
7. Ares scoops €400m pan-European office portfolio
8. ING Bank buys Cisco office in Amsterdam
9. ING makes €69m loss on sale of struggling Dutch mall
10. Vastint buys landmark Amsterdam campus building for €61m

Source: PropertyEU Research
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Transactions totalling €6.4 bn closed in the first nine months of this year and a large volume is hanging over the Dutch market, according to an analysis by PropertyEU Research.

Listed Dutch property company Wereldhave completed the largest deal so far this year as it stakes out its position as the dominant owner of mid-sized shopping centres in the Netherlands. The repositioning follows the takeover of Corio by French peer Klépierre and Unibail-Rodamco's decision to focus purely on larger malls in key European cities.

The acquisition of a €770 mln shopping centre portfolio involved Wereldhave getting control of the mid-sized Dutch centres Corio had tried and failed to divest, leaving it open to the takeover by Paris-listed Klépierre. The French retail specialist, like Unibail-Rodamco, is only interested in large dominant centres or smaller centres at important transport hubs in Western Europe.

The second largest transaction this year relates to hospitality group Accor divesting a 29-asset portfolio of German and Dutch hotels in a €234 mln sale-and-leaseback transaction less than a year after acquiring most of the properties. Eleven of the hotels are in the Netherlands.

End-of-year rush
Dutch investment activity appears to be picking up in the last quarter of the year as €700 mln of deals was seen in the first weeks of October, bring the total volume over the year in excess of €7 bn. And in the last week of October German investor Patrizia acquired a portfolio of 145 retail, residential and office units for around €340 mln.

The move is interesting as Patrizia's initial focus in the Netherlands was on the expected sell-off of large portfolios by the country's public housing companies. Patrizia, unlike other pure-play residential investors who have come into the market, also has a long history of big-ticket office and retail transactions, and the company made clear from day one that it would not limit itself to residential in the Netherlands.

From the transaction data it is clear portfolio deals are a key feature of the Dutch investment market, accounting for 55% of the total deal volume to date. Several more really big portfolio deals are pending with some set to close before the end of the year. These include insurer Delta Lloyd's €2.2 bn in direct real estate; office assets being sold by Dutch investor Altera and a portfolio of Credit Suisse assets.

Market watchers also expect an announcement before year-end about Syntrus Achmea Real Estate & Finance acquiring a portfolio of Dutch high street retail units from private investor Ronny Rosenbaum for an estimated €1.5 bn.

News is also expected about the office element of the tower De Rotterdam in the Kop van Zuid district of the port city.

Back in the game
Last year foreign buyers, often operating an opportunistic strategy, were the dominant force in the Dutch market. This year domestic investors have come back strongly and accounted for 51% of the total volume for the first nine months, up from 34% in 2014. Patrizia's Dutch office came the percentage of cross-border buyers a significant boost in October and the outcome of a few last deals in November and December will decide when domestic or foreign buyers end the year on top.

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By Petra Kooijman, Paul Wessels and Cormac Mac Ruairi