AXA Investment Managers – Real Assets, on behalf of clients, has completed the sale of Ropemaker Place, a prime office building in the City of London, to a subsidiary of Ho Bee Land, a Singaporean listed company, for £650 million ($860 million).
AXA IM – Real Assets acquired Ropemaker Place in 2013 on behalf of a joint venture comprising one European and two Asian investors.
Ropemaker Place, at 25 Ropemaker Street, EC2, was developed in 2009 and offers 571,000 square feet of class A office accommodation in addition to groundfloor retail and ancillary space. The 21-story, 602,000-square-foot building is 96 percent leased to a strong line-up of investment grade tenants. The asset has a BREEAM Excellent sustainability rating and was the first building in the City of London to achieve a LEED Platinum pre-certification for sustainability.
The transaction follows another high-priced sale of a London office building to an Asian investor. The London headquarters for multinational investment bank UBS was bought for £1 billion ($1.33 billion) by Hong Kong–based CK Asset Holdings. The sellers of 5 Broadgate were British Land and GIC, Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund.
