Chinese Developer Secures £770M In Funding To Restart Troubled Nine Elms Tower
Chinese property giant R&F is set to restart work on its troubled Nine Elms scheme in south London after reaching a £772M funding deal with a new group of lenders.
R&F has reached an agreement with Apollo Global Management, Carlyle Group, Crosstree Real Estate Partners and Précis Capital to provide £772M of debt for the scheme, React News reported.
Apollo is understood to have provided up to two-thirds of the funding, which will allow contractor Multiplex to restart work on the One Nine Elms site. The funding deal provides breathing space for R&F, which had been forced to sell off a number of its major UK developments in 2022.
Multiplex had halted construction on the £900M One Nine Elms site in March citing lack of payment on the project. The 57-storey tower will include a five-star hotel under the Park Hyatt brand, a further 103 apartments also branded as Park Hyatt residences as well as 334 resi apartments. A total of 57 affordable homes will also be built and managed by Thames Valley Housing.
The One Nine Elms site includes two towers, one 56-storeys in height and a 42-storey tower. R&F bought the site in January 2018 from fellow Chinese developer Dalian Wanda, which was looking to sell assets to pay down debt.
Multiplex was chosen to build the 1.14M SF mixed-use scheme by Wanda in 2017. The scheme is currently 50% complete, with around three-quarters of the facade work in place.
R&F, which is based in the Chinese city of Guangzhou, sold a neighbouring development site at Vauxhall Square to Far East Consortium for £96M, making a £69M loss. It has also sold its 50% stake in the 1.7M SF Thames City scheme to its joint venture partner CC Land.
