Tritax agrees £72 million loan facility with Canada Life

Tritax Big Box REIT has secured a £72 million ($94.6 million) fixed-rate, interest-only loan against a three-asset portfolio, marking its first lending facility through Canada Life Investments. 

The facility, which has a fixed all-in rate of 2.64 percent and is repayable in April 2029, will be drawn in full immediately and the amounts drawn down will be segregated and non-recourse, Tritax said in a statement.

The facility extends the group’s weighted average unexpired loan term from 4.4 years to 5.3 years and increases its loan to value (LTV) to approximately 33 percent.

“The board continues to seek to optimise the capital structure of the company to ensure both longer and shorter term facilities can be employed as appropriate to underpin our dividend and support our growth plans,” said Colin Godfrey, partner at Tritax, in the statement, adding that this was the first such lending agreement with Canada Life.

The REIT is a listed vehicle with pure exposure to the “Big Box” logistics asset class in the UK, investing in and managing both standing and pre-let forward funded development assets. A company spokesperson did not immediately respond to requests for comment regarding the underlying assets on the Canada Life deal.

Also this week, Tritax announced it had extended the maturity a £50.9m debt facility with Helaba by three years following completion of the Ocado distribution warehouse at Erith, from July 2020 to July 2023. Ocado signed a 30-year lease for the property, which Tritax forward funded in a £98.8m deal last year.

Following that deal Tritax said its blended margin payable across the company’s debt financing will be 1.43 percent above three month LIBOR and its all-in capped cost of borrowing is 2.86 percent.

Tritax focuses on modern “Big Box” logistics assets, typically greater than 500,000 sq ft, let to institutional-grade tenants on long-term leases that are typically at least 12 years in length.