First post-downturn Irish CMBS imminent

The first CMBS backed by Irish assets since 2006 is expected to come to the market this week, Real Estate Capital can reveal.

Deutsche Bank is to issue DECO 2015 HARP in the next few days and it is expected to be between €175m and €200m in size.

The CMBS will comprise three loans to several borrowers secured mainly against offices and multi-family residential buildings in Dublin.

One loan is to Kennedy Wilson secured against the 272-unit apartment block Vantage at Central Park in Dublin. Kennedy Wilson acquired Vantage as part of a €310m joint venture purchase of Central Park with Green REIT from NAMA in January 2014, which saw Kennedy Wilson take the residential element and Green the office element.

It is thought that Harp was initially expected to be made-up of two further loans that would have taken the CMBS to over €300m. However, one loan in the bank’s pipeline is now going to be syndicated and the closing of the other has been delayed.

The CMBS market has made a gradual but steady recovery since the downturn, with €8bn of issuance in 2015 and €4bn last year, secured on collateral in Germany, France, the Netherlands and Italy as well as the UK. Deutsche Bank has been one of the leading arranging banks in the market’s revival.

So far there have been two deals this year, both in Italy. In January Bank of America Merrill Lynch issued its €286.4m Taurus 2015-1 CMBS secured against Italian collateral owned by Orion Capital Managers, Cerberus Capital Management and Blackstone. In the same month Cairn Capital and Banca IMI closed the €203.1m Tibert CMBS, secured against the Statuto Group’s Montenapoleone Retail asset in Milan.