Blackstone Ramps Up Residential Push After £580M Vistry Deal

In a further move into the UK’s housing market, Blackstone and its partner Regis are to acquire 1,750 new homes from housebuilder Vistry in a £580M deal.

Vistry said in a release that the portfolio, focused primarily in the south-east of England and spanning 36 developments from Vistry’s former housebuilding land bank, will be managed by the single-family rental specialist Leaf Living, which is backed by funds managed by private equity giant Blackstone and Regis.

The homes are to be presold in line with Vistry’s partnerships strategy of preselling circa 65% of all homes across the business and will help the group drive toward its medium-term financial targets, Vistry added.

The first completions under the agreement with Blackstone and Regis are anticipated by the end of June, with most homes expected to be finished within the next two years, Vistry said.

“By working in partnership with organisations like Leaf Living we can maximise the number of high-quality homes we deliver every year,” Vistry CEO Greg Fitzgerald said in a statement.

“This agreement supports our differentiated business model, with the certainty provided by the pre-selling of homes enabling us to accelerate our build programmes. This year we are on track to deliver more than a 10% increase in new home completions.”

Vistry has been relatively bullish about prospects in the housing sector and last month raised its annual homebuilding target by around 3% to more than 18,000 units despite rivals such as Taylor Wimpey and Persimmon warning of subdued market conditions.

Blackstone has pledged to become a major player in the UK housing market, and last month it was revealed that Sage, an affordable housing business backed by Blackstone, had reached a portfolio valuation of more than £1B and could more than double in size over the next five years.

In addition, Blackstone paid £819M for 2,915 homes being built by Vistry last November. Of those, 1,522 units are being delivered to Leaf Living and 1,393 affordable homes for rent and shared ownership are being delivered to Sage. 

“Institutional private capital can play an important role in providing high-quality housing stock across the UK, particularly in the private rented sector which is significantly undersupplied today,” Blackstone Head of European Real Estate James Seppala said in the announcement.

“Partnerships such as these can meaningfully accelerate the delivery of new homes and help alleviate structural undersupply across the sector.”

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