One Of The Biggest London Deals Canned During Lockdown Could Be Back On
A £450M London office deal that was put on hold during the coronavirus-induced lockdown has been revived.
ARA Dunedin is back in talks to buy a 50% stake in the Nova office scheme in Victoria from Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, Property Week reported. The deal was put on hold in March.
Nova is a 550K SF scheme comprising three buildings, two of which are offices and one of which is residential, with flats in that final building having been sold off to individual buyers. The ground floor comprises 17 restaurants and three food kiosks.
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The £900M scheme was developed by CPPIB and Landsec in a 50/50 joint venture. Landsec had explored selling its half of the scheme but ultimately decided to retain it.
The deal would be the first undertaken by Singaporean ARA since it bought UK asset management firm Dunedin, as part of a wider push into UK and European real estate. Property Week said the lockdown in Asia prevented ARA from holding an external capital raising for the deal, but it is now confident of raising finance.
If the deal does go ahead, it would be one of a number of transactions involving Asian investors to be reanimated as the lockdown in the UK eases. In June, Link REIT bought the 453K SF Cabot building in Canary Wharf for £380M. Blackstone pulled out of a purchase of the building in March.
Landsec is undertaking the development of the next phase of the wider Nova development in Victoria, a 166K SF building which it started speculatively last year.
