Bankia, Spain's third largest banking group, is seeking to sell its real estate subsidiary, the manager of a €5.5 bn portfolio across the country.
Bankia, Spain's third largest banking group, is seeking to sell its real estate subsidiary, the manager of a €5.5 bn portfolio across the country.
According to Spanish press reports, the lender has short-listed private equity group Cerberus, New York-based private investor Centerbridge and Texas Pacific Group for a second round of talks on the sale of the Bankia Habitat unit.
In total, Bankia received some 20 offers from investors including Morgan Stanley, Fortress, Okatree and Apollo.
The transaction is expected to fetch some €120-150 mln.
The selected bidder will take control of the Bankia Habitat’s headquarters in Madrid and Valencia as well as be responsible for its managed portfolio consisting of real estate assets worth €2.9 bn and another €2.6 bn of development loans.
Bankia Habitat employs around 500 staff which is understood to represent the main bottleneck of the transaction. The group ended 2012 having sold some 14,600 real estate assets for a total amount of €1.6 bn.
Centerbridge has been an active player in Spain with the purchase last year of bank Banesto’s Aktua property subsidiary for €100 mln. Cerberus recently acquired a non-performing loan portfolio with a face value of €300 mln from lender Santander and another €574 mln worth of debt from savings bank Liberbank.
