Paris-based Tikehau Capital, the alternative asset management and investment group, has acquired The Walnuts Shopping Centre in Orpington in the UK, in partership with Areli Real Estate, from Patrizia Immobilien.
Financial details were not disclosed, but local reports place the deal in the £35 mln (€41 mln) range. This would mean a yield close to 7%.
The Walnuts' site comprises some 22,500 m2 of space, including a 13,700 m2 shopping centre with 58 stores, alongside an Odeon cinema and an 83-room Premier-Inn hotel.
The asset has been purchased through Tikehau's real estate value-added fund, which was launched in 2018. it is located in the centre of Orpington, which lies 13 miles south east of Central London.
'This second real estate deal in the United Kingdom demonstrates Tikehau Capital's strategy to strengthen the development of its activities in the country,' said Tikehau Capital’s head of real estate Frédéric Jariel.
Tikehau's first deal in the country was the Nicholsons shopping centre in Maidenhead, acquired earlier this year. Jariel said at the time that the Maidenhead acquisition confirmed 'our strategy to focus on repositioning well-located assets to unlock their full potential'.
Areli Real Estate, a UK-based urban regeneration specialist, will work alongside Tikehau Capital as an operating partner, as it did for the acquisition of the Nicholsons Shopping Centre in Maidenhead. Repositioning plans have not been unveiled for the scheme, but Patrizia is understood to have marketed the asset as a 'potential residential conversion'.
The purchase marks the fund’s sixth investment following a sale & lease back operation, the acquisition of a mixed-use portfolio in Brussels, two hotels located in central Paris, and the partnership with Bouygues Immobilier for the Charenton-Bercy redevelopment project in the Greater Paris area.
The pan-European real estate value-added fund, which was launched in 2018, invests across all real estate asset classes.
'This is an important step in the deployment of Tikehau Capital’s real estate value-added fund across Europe,' Jariel noted.
Patrizia bought the site from Rockspring Property Investment Managers in 2017. Rockspring had added the Odeon cinema and restaurant area as part of its asset management initiatives.
Rockspring purchased the property for £44 mln in 2015 from Miller Developments and a private Kuwait fund.
