AXA Investment Managers – Real Assets and Irish JV partner Kennedy Wilson sign acquisition of Dublin residential development for €161m

AXA Investment Managers – Real Assets, on behalf of clients and alongside its 50/50 Irish PRS joint venture partner Kennedy Wilson, has acquired 274 residential units at The Grange, South Co. Dublin, as well as an adjacent four-acre PRS development site for €161 million ($188 million).

The Grange is a residential complex totaling 506 units spread across nine separate blocks of between four and eight stories set on a landscaped four-acre site in Sandyford, South Dublin. 174 of the 274 units acquired by the joint venture are located in 100 percent controlled blocks with more than 60 percent of these having been completed in the last five years, with the remainder completed in 2007 and recently refurbished. The newly acquired units have a current occupancy of 95 percent and are considered to present attractive reversionary potential.

Further to the standing assets, the joint venture intends to apply for planning permission to substantially increase its holdings at The Grange through the development of additional residential units on an adjacent four-acre site. High-quality resident amenities will be developed as part of this new scheme, which may include a gym, lounge area, business center and an on-site management office, serving both the existing and new joint venture-owned units.

Construction is expected to commence next year, allowing for the new units to be expected to be delivered to the market in 2021.

The Grange is located in the affluent South County Dublin suburb of Sandyford, which is just off the M50 motorway and benefits from good public transport links via the LUAS tram line. There are a number of reputable multinational companies operating within a 10-minute walk of The Grange and a continuous flow of corporate occupiers increasingly relocating to the area, driving demand for rentable residential accommodation locally.

“This investment is directly in line with the stated strategy of our joint venture and increases its portfolio of designated PRS units in the attractive Dublin market to a meaningful scale,” said John O’Driscoll, European head of transactions at AXA IM – Real Assets. “The Grange is a high-quality scheme in a well-connected and desirable location that benefits from increasing occupier demand in line with local employment growth and supportive underlying market dynamics. Furthermore, there is attractive long-term prospects to increase the rental intake, both through the currently under-rented units and the significant on-site development potential. We look forward to bringing our joint venture’s best-in-class approach to incorporating this latest investment into our wider PRS platform, while we continue to review new opportunities to build scale across large urban centers in Ireland.”