Klépierre buys Spanish retail complex for €233m
Klépierre has acquired Nueva Condomina, a shopping mall in the region of Murcia, Spain, for €233 million ($260 million).
Klépierre purchased 100 percent of the shares of the Spanish entity that directly owns Nueva Condomina from a subsidiary of BNP Paribas Fortis SA/NV.
Nueva Condomina totals more than 1.18 million square feet with 178 shops. In 2016, it attracted nearly 11 million visitors and generated €257 million ($288 million) in retailer sales.
Following this acquisition, Nueva Condomina becomes the third-largest asset in Klépierre’s Spanish portfolio in terms of net rental income.
Spanish retail investment volume totaled €1.5 billion ($1.7 billion) during the first quarter 2017, well ahead of the other property assets’ transaction volume during the first quarter 2016, according to Cushman & Wakefield. The largest transaction was the acquisition of the Xanadu shopping center in Madrid, a prime asset in terms of performance, traded for €530 million ($594 million). Another prime high street asset in downtown Madrid was acquired for €100 million ($112 million) by the insurance company Generali.
Madrid also witnessed the opening of a fully refurbished retail outlet center, which is attracting a high interest from potential buyers. This is the first delivery of shopping centers in the pipeline for 2017, which totals 230,000 square meters of SBA, a five-year record. Rents are primed to advance for shopping centers as well as for properties near prime and secondary high-street locations.
Cushman & Wakefield expects leasing activity to remain sound in the years ahead as retailers keep on entering the market and vacancy rates in secondary locations reduce accordingly. Retail investment will maintain its tempo and investors will most probably benefit from higher rents. However, most of the return will come from the income side, as capital values have now less room to increase.
