Peakside Capital Advisors has purchased a 5,400 sq.m. office in Frankfurt from Patrizia for the recently closed Peakside Real Estate Fund IV (PREF IV). The parties agreed not to disclose the purchase price.
The nine-storey building at Friedrichstrasse 2-6 in the Westend-Nord district was originally constructed in 1968 and last refurbished in 2020/2021.
The occupancy rate is 96 percent with a weighted average lease term of 2.3 years. The property also includes 35 parking spaces.
Simon Lutz, Partner at Peakside, says: “The asset has been well maintained and requires limited upfront investment. The opportunity lies in bringing rents to market levels and the establishment of a high-quality office brand tailored to the submarket’s demand.”
The micro location benefits from good transport, public and social infrastructure and a sustained office demand. It is located in a vibrant mixed neighbourhood between Goethe University and the Old Opera House. Underground stations Grüneburgweg and Holzhausenstrasse are within walking distance.
The office serves as the initial investment of the PREF IV fund which Peakside closed after only eleven months of fundraising at close to €415m of equity.
Frank Schäfer, Managing Director and Head of Business Development at Peakside, comments: “Due to the massive interest by investors, we raised the original hard cap target by 20 percent but still could not satisfy the full demand for subscriptions. With this initial transaction we are well placed to perpetuate the excellent performance of the PREF fund series and merit the trust our investors have bestowed upon the strategy.”
At a planned LTV of 60 percent, the fund will invest in real estate worth around €1.2bn across all asset classes in Germany, with a focus on properties which are affected by pricing dislocations, “stranded” in sales processes, have additional (re-)financing needs and on assets with value-add or conversion potential. Ticket size will range from between €30m to €200m.
Boris Schran, Managing Partner at Peakside, sees amble product for the PREF IV fund coming to market: “In an ESG-driven ‘work-out’, property owners are currently sorting their portfolio into different clusters, ranging from already sustainable assets via those they want to retain and refurbish themselves to the ones for sale. Most of the latter hold great value-add potential. The main reason why they are put up for sale at all is a lack of in-house capacity to tackle all assets within a relatively short timeframe. This creates opportunity for us and our investors.”
