Savills IM completes Berlin trophy asset sale to Brookfield

Savills Fund Management has completed the sale of a portfolio of prime Berlin properties to Brookfield Property Partners.

The Potsdamer Platz portfolio was inherited by Savills Investment Management’s German arm when it took over Frankfurt-based SEB Asset Management earlier this year.

Brookfield’s listed property company, which won a bidding process, has not revealed how much it paid for the portfolio.

The deal, according to Axel Kraus, managing director at Savills Fund Management, emphasises the “international significance of Potsdamer Platz as a sought-after business centre and a superlative and vibrant part of Berlin”. 

SEB held the assets in its ImmoInvest mutual fund since purchase in 2008.

The 267,000sqm portfolio was sold for around €1.4bn, according to media reports.

The portfolio – which is 20% vacant and includes office, retail and residential space – was valued at approximately €1.2bn in the fund’s annual report, published in March.

Most of the portfolio’s vacancy is in the Eichenhornstrasse 3 office building, currently being repositioned.

Tenants include Etihad Airways, China’s ICBC, Daimler and Habitat, as well as law Freshfields and Olswang.

SEB Asset Management last year sold a portfolio of 11 German offices to US REIT Northstar for €1.1bn.