Real estate loan sales to hit €50b in 2014: C&W

European real estate loan sales will hit €50 bn in 2014, according to revised figures from Cushman & Wakefield.

The revision follows deals worth almost €30 bn in the first three months of the year, virtually equal to 2013’s total. At the beginning of the year, C&W predicted €40 bn in deals for full-year 2014, but since then the market has seen some frenetic and large scale deal making, the adviser said. So far, some €29.8 bn of business has been done this year.

C&W’s Federico Montero said: 'The European real estate loan sale market could reach its peak in 2014 as activity soared in the first few months of this year. We won’t see a quarter like this for quite some time.’

The 2014 figures have been pushed along in part by sales of most of the remaining debt from ‘bad bank’ Irish Bank Resolution Corporation. In the last 14 months, €20 bn of the €21.7 bn debts has been sold on.

‘The speed at which the processes were concluded is a clear message that investor appetite is at an all-time high, with plenty of capital still to deploy,’ said Montero.