Commercial real estate lender Starwood European Finance has granted £264 mln (€333 mln) of capital in four separate transactions in the UK and the Netherlands, bringing its European financing volume to date to over £1 bn.
Commercial real estate lender Starwood European Finance has granted £264 mln (€333 mln) of capital in four separate transactions in the UK and the Netherlands, bringing its European financing volume to date to over £1 bn.
Starwood Property Trust and private funds managed by Starwood Capital Group have committed to a £102 mln first mortgage loan for the development of Baltimore Wharf, a 46-story residential tower and
18-story housing development containing a total of 366 private residential and affordable housing units.
Starwood Property Trust will originate £87 mln of the loan and private funds managed by Starwood Capital Group will provide £15 mln. The loan’s interest rate floats over Libor and has a term of 40 months. Frogmore Real Estate, Galliard Homes, CJO’Shea Group and LBS Properties are the sponsors on the transaction.
Urban Exposure has served as a key transaction adviser, contributed as a minority lender in the facility
and been appointed facility agent.
Situated in the growing Docklands area of London, Baltimore Wharf is located just south of the Canary Wharf central business district. The tower units have been substantially pre-sold.
SEREF also provided a £27 mln loan for the refinancing of First Central 200, a new, seven-story, 164,000 sq ft office building located within West London's Park Royal business district. Co-investors Wainbridge Global Opportunities London and a real estate fund of funds managed by Morgan Stanley recently invested substantial capital to complete the building and bring the asset to Class A status. The property is currently 45% leased to Bechtel, a subsidiary of Bechtel Corp., a global engineering, procurement, construction and project manager.
DUTCH DEALS]
Starwood has also beefed up its portfolio in the Netherlands with a new loan and an extension of an existing one in the country.
In a new deal, Starwood Property Trust, Starwood European Real Estate Finance (SEREF) and private funds managed by Starwood Capital Group have provided a €99 mln loan for the refinancing and refurbishment of a new W-branded hotel located in the centre of Amsterdam.
Starwood Property Trust will originate €56 mln of the loan, SEREF will provide €25 mln and private funds managed by Starwood Capital Group will provide €16 mln. The loan’s interest rate floats over Euribor and has a two-year term with a one-year extension option.
The sponsor is Liran Wizman, a hotel owner and key shareholder in Grand City Hotels, a pan-European hotel management company.
Slated to be completed in the third quarter of 2015, the refurbished hotel is based in Spuistraat, a prime location within Amsterdam. Property finance boutique Buchler Barnett Spencer acted as advisor for the sponsor.
'Funding two high-profile commercial real estate projects such the development of Baltimore Wharf and the refurbishment of the W Amsterdam reflects the depth of our lending platform in Europe and our ability to continuously source attractive financing opportunities outside of the United States,' said Jeff Dishner, senior managing director and global head of Real Estate Acquisitions at Starwood Capital Group.
LOAN EXTENSION
In addition, SEREF, along with private funds managed by Starwood Capital Group has expanded an existing first mortgage loan by €36 mln with MBAY Netherlands, bringing the total financing to over €71 mln.
The total loan’s interest rate floats over Euribor and has a term of five years. The sponsor is a joint venture between light industrial specialist M7 Real Estate and Bayside Capital, a credit-oriented investment firm. The latest financing is the second increase to the facility, and serves to facilitate the sponsor’s acquisition of nine additional light industrial properties throughout the Netherlands, bringing the total number of assets in the portfolio to 28.
M7 Cortona, the Dutch asset management arm of M7 Real Estate, is providing asset and property management services to the portfolio.