This Week's London Deal Sheet
The Deal Sheet is a weekly compilation of Greater London and beyond's biggest leases, sales, financing deals, construction updates and personnel moves. Have news you’d like to submit? Email mark.faithfull@bisnow.com.
Blackstone Real Estate Debt Strategies has acquired a $1B performing senior mortgage loan portfolio from German lender Deutsche Pfandbriefbank on an all-cash basis. The portfolio of senior mortgage loans was originated by PBB.
The portfolio comprises 11 loans secured against multifamily, office and hospitality assets across the UK and U.S. and are backed by “cash-flowing, well-located assets with experienced borrowers”, Blackstone said in its announcement.
“We are excited to acquire this diversified portfolio of performing loans across property sectors and geographies, on behalf of our BREDS investors. We have established ourselves as a trusted counterparty for financial institutions, such as PBB, as they look to optimise their balance sheets. This transaction reflects our expertise, strong relationships, and our ability to deploy scale capital with speed and certainty.” BREDS Senior Managing Director Steve Plavin said in a statement.
Jones Day acted as legal adviser to BREDS. King & Spalding served as legal adviser to PBB.
FINANCE
Special Opportunities REIT has published a prospectus in connection with its IPO on the London Stock Exchange’s main market.
The company is targeting a fundraise of £500M from an initial placing, an offer for subscription and cornerstone subscriptions.
In a statement, the new business said that it had received commitments from three cornerstone investors: GoldenTree Asset Management, TR Property Investment Trust and other Columbia Threadneedle investments funds, and the Bhavnani family office, to subscribe for between 104 million and 119 million ordinary shares, valued at £104M to £119M.
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Puma Property Finance has provided an £18M facility to fund the development of a new care home in Ewell, Surrey. The loan, provided to Morrison Community Care Group, will deliver an 81-bed scheme.
Built over six floors with communal facilities and amenities, including a salon, cinema and restaurant, the development loan is Puma’s first with MCCG and is the latter’s first development in England, having operated primarily in Scotland. Construction will begin this summer with practical completion expected in February 2026.
DEALS
LondonMetric Property has sold seven properties in separate transactions for £31.3M, reflecting a blended net initial yield of 7% and a 3% profit over prevailing book values.
The properties include £18.3M of non-core LXi REIT assets, comprising a 106K SF Asda store in Scotland sold for £10.5M; a 41K SF retail park in Ipswich let to Wickes, Topps Tiles, McDonalds and Costa sold for £10.2M; two former Cazoo car showrooms in Edinburgh and Cardiff sold for £6.4M; a B&M store in Stourbridge (a former Mucklow asset) sold for £2.8M and a Travelodge hotel and a pub sold for £1.4M.
Separately, LondonMetric has acquired six reversionary urban warehouse assets for £45M, reflecting a net initial yield of 6.1% and a reversionary yield of 6.6%. These include a 106K SF warehouse in Cardiff let to Booker; a 95K SF warehouse in Milton Keynes let to Ingram Content Group; a 30K SF multi-let warehouse in York; a 28K SF multi-let warehouse in Reading plus two warehouses totalling 37K SF in Derby and Huntingdon, acquired through a 15-year sale and leaseback with Travis Perkins.
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Community pub group Admiral Taverns, owned by real estate private equity firm Proprium Capital Partners, is set to acquire a portfolio of 37 freehold pubs from Fuller, Smith & Turner in an £18.3M deal.
The portfolio of 37 community, wet-led sites sits across London, Surrey, Sussex and Hampshire. In a release, Admiral said, “The acquisition not only scales the group’s UK wide estate to a total of over 1,420 pubs, but further strengthens Admiral’s presence in the south-east of England, taking the group’s number of pubs in the region to over 300.”
Over the past 12 months, Admiral has invested £39M to revamp its current portfolio.
DEVELOPMENT
Mount Anvil and The Riverside Group have exchanged contracts for a joint venture to regenerate of the Tiller Road Estate on the Isle of Dogs. The move follows Mount Anvil’s selection as the preferred development partner.
The scheme will be Mount Anvil’s and The Riverside Group’s second estate regeneration scheme in the area and aims to deliver over 300 new homes within Tower Hamlets. It will include new affordable and private homes in addition to the supply of 72 homes for current residents to replace those in the three existing buildings: Kedge House, Starboard Way and Winch House.
The project expands Mount Anvil’s partnership with The Riverside Group, following the previous delivery of 218 homes as part of the regeneration of the nearby Bellamy Close and Byng Street Estate. The partnership’s portfolio also includes new affordable homes at Friars Close Estate, Southwark and 262 affordable homes as part of an 854-home masterplan at Royal Eden Docks, Newham.
