REC staff

Russell makes L&G comeback Mark Russell has returned to Legal & General Property as fund manager for the £750m L&G Managed Pension Fund. The fund is LGP’s longest established and has 300 investors. It spent £275m last year, after taking in more cash. Russell worked on LGP’s Linked Life Fund from 2000 to 2006. He […]

Capital poured into unlisted property funds in the final quarter of 2009 at five times the rate of Q3 2009. Figures from The Association of Real Estate Funds showed the highest-ever quarterly commitment by investors, of £3.2bn, or £2.9bn after redemptions of £300m, compared with a net £400m in Q3 2009. More than half of […]

Manager reports inflows of £50m-£60m per month for property funds

The ING UK Property Income Fund has completed a two-year restructuring by raising £22.4m of fresh equity at net asset value. Six of the limited partnership’s 13 investors took all the equity offered, which will be used to pay off debt with lender Nationwide. The partnership was due to be wound up at the end […]

Insurance groups Axa and M&G Investments have helped to underwrite €441m of refinancing for ProLogis’s European Property Fund (PEPR). The insurers were part of a syndicate that underwrote a €300m senior loan facility at 52% loan-to-value, secured on 39 French, Belgian, Spanish and Italian distribution centres. Axa makes senior loans through its Axa Real Estate […]

“We have absolute visibility on an increasing level of stock due to come onto the market… Compared with the desert of stock last year we expect an oasis of assets to choose from later in 2010.” Great Portland Estates’ chief executive Toby Courtauld after releasing the company’s Q3 interim management statement last month “I was […]

Servicer avoids foreclosure on €766m Dutch property loan backing Opera (Uni-Invest) CMBS

Barclays Commercial Bank is financing a second large acquisition for long-standing client M1 Real Estate. The bank provided a senior facility to help the Lebanese investor to secure Victoria House in Bloomsbury Square, London, ahead of 10 other institutional investors, for about £175m. The vendor was Ireland-based investor the Mortiz Group. Barclays plans to sell […]

Bayern Landesbank is back in the property lending market with an ambitious target to provide more than £1bn for UK property deals this year. The German bank, led in London by Mike Worley, has told a number of lenders, brokers and valuers that it has up to £1.2bn available for deals. Part of this capital […]

Consortium seeks to extend bonds’ maturity in a first for CMBS market