The owner-managed investment manager Aukera Real Estate AG, based in Essen, has concluded a senior secured financing for a property in the Netherlands. After refinancing a Dutch portfolio of more than 65 properties just a few weeks ago, the Aukera Real Estate Debt Lux. fund, structured as a Luxembourg S.C.A. SICAV RAIF, this time refinanced a development near completion with 531 student apartments in the city of Tilburg, which has a population of almost 230,000. The fund replaces the construction financing and refinances a volume of 60 million euros. The term of the loan is seven years.

The project “The City Tilburg” comprises around 27,000 m² of gross floor space and is being built on a site directly adjacent to the university campus. The student apartments add up to almost 13,200 m² of rentable area. In addition to various community rooms for e.g., fitness, cinema, music and games, the complex also includes a 150 m² restaurant as well as 650 bicycle and 112 car parking spaces. Designed as a green building, the complex will be equipped with efficient air-source heat pumps for heating and cooling and photovoltaic roof panels for electricity generation. The concept also includes a green roof garden. “The City Tilburg” is scheduled to be ready for occupancy in January 2024.

Refinancing with high security standards

The financing offers a high degree of security to the investors of the Aukera Fund, all German insurance companies. The loan is senior secured, the owner is an experienced, long-term investor from the Netherlands, the property has an excellent ESG standard (especially “E” and “S”) and Tilburg suffers from a chronic housing shortage. 

Patrick Züchner, CIO of Aukera Real Estate AG, explains: “We consider the student housing market segment in Tilburg as well as in other university cities in the Netherlands to be very attractive. The demand for such apartments will remain very high, not least due to foreign students. This is good for the property and also good for the investors in our fund.” 

Aukera’s fourth transaction in the Netherlands 

With this 16th transaction, the loan volume of the Aukera Fund grows to 1.58 billion euros. Of these, four transactions with a volume of 268 million euros are attributable to financings in the Netherlands. Aukera closed three of them in the past six months. 

In the current transaction, Aukera Real Estate was legally advised by the international law firm Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner (BCLP) and by the law firm AKD, which is strongly represented in the Benelux countries. 

 Aukera Real Estate AG, an owner-managed investment management firm based in Essen, Germany, is lending EUR 130 million through its Aukera Real Estate Debt Fund to Connection Property Development S.A. (“Connection”). The senior secured facility will be used to finance CONNECTION (https://www.connection.lu/), an office/retail mixed-use property being marketed by Silverfinch Property & Asset Management S.A. and offering around 49,400 sq.m. of rental space. Completion is scheduled for the end of the year, and the Green Core asset will remain in Connection’s long-term investment portfolio. 50 per cent of the property is already pre-let. 

The property is located in a prime location at Rue de Bitbourg 21-25, with quick access to Luxembourg city centre as well as to the airport. The building is a Nearly Zero-Energy Building (NZEB) with a BREEAM sustainability rating of “Excellent” and an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) rating of “AAA”. Thanks to its high energy efficiency, the building offers significantly lower operating costs than the Luxembourg market average. 

“With this bridge-to-exit financing for a prime mixed-use project carrying a BREEAM rating of ‘Excellent’, we were able to provide a credit facility at attractive conditions backed by a sustainable and future-proof asset as collateral, thereby taking optimal advantage of current market conditions for the benefit of our investors,” explains Florian Niebur, Investment Manager at Aukera Real Estate. 

“The financing is enabling us to increase the value of this Green Core property asset in a difficult market environment while also permitting an optimally timed exit 

 Aukera Real Estate AG, an owner-managed investment management firm based in Essen, Germany, is lending EUR 130 million through its Aukera Real Estate Debt Fund to Connection Property Development S.A. (“Connection”). The senior secured facility will be used to finance CONNECTION (https://www.connection.lu/), an office/retail mixed-use property being marketed by Silverfinch Property & Asset Management S.A. and offering around 49,400 sq.m. of rental space. Completion is scheduled for the end of the year, and the Green Core asset will remain in Connection’s long-term investment portfolio. 50 per cent of the property is already pre-let. 

The property is located in a prime location at Rue de Bitbourg 21-25, with quick access to Luxembourg city centre as well as to the airport. The building is a Nearly Zero-Energy Building (NZEB) with a BREEAM sustainability rating of “Excellent” and an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) rating of “AAA”. Thanks to its high energy efficiency, the building offers significantly lower operating costs than the Luxembourg market average. 

“With this bridge-to-exit financing for a prime mixed-use project carrying a BREEAM rating of ‘Excellent’, we were able to provide a credit facility at attractive conditions backed by a sustainable and future-proof asset as collateral, thereby taking optimal advantage of current market conditions for the benefit of our investors,” explains Florian Niebur, Investment Manager at Aukera Real Estate. 

“The financing is enabling us to increase the value of this Green Core property asset in a difficult market environment while also permitting an optimally timed exit through a subsequent refinancing once the project is completed and stabilised,” adds Kindy Fritsch, Managing Director at Connection Property Development S.A. “CONNECTION is set for completion by the end of the year as scheduled, and lease marketing is proceeding at full speed.” 

With this 15th successfully closed financing transaction, the total lending volume by Aukera since its incorporation in July 2020 increases to EUR 1.52 billion. 

 Aukera Real Estate AG, an owner-managed investment management firm based in Essen, Germany, has refinanced the former Deutsche Bundesbank building in central Dresden. The new senior secured debt funding in the amount of approx. EUR 33 million has been provided by the Aukera Real Estate Debt fund, which is structured as a Luxembourg S.C.A. SICAV RAIF. The capital will also be used to finance further tenant expansions. The property is owned by a Swiss real estate development and management corporation. 

The historic listed building on St. Petersburger Strasse offers some 8,400 sq.m. of rental space and is fully leased out. The anchor tenants are the Free State of Saxony and DKMS, a company which operates Germany’s largest typing laboratory for stem cell donors on the premises. The building is located at Dresden’s finest address directly next to the Kurländer Palace. 

“Despite our fundamental caution with regard to the office asset class, this is a special case because of the tenant mix of the Free State of Saxony and DKMS, the resulting high security of cash flows, and the superb location, which together convinced us of the attractiveness of this refinancing opportunity,” explains Markus Schulz, Investment Manager at Aukera Real Estate. 

The international law firm Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner (BCLP) advised Aukera Real Estate on the transaction. With this 14th successful financing since Aukera’s founding in July 2020, the company’s total lending has now grown to EUR 1.39 billion. 

Aukera Real Estate AG, an independent investment management firm based in Essen, Germany, has successfully completed a senior secured financing of more than EUR 150 million for a Netherlands real estate portfolio. The deal, executed through the Aukera Real Estate Debt Lux. fund, a Luxembourg S.C.A. SICAV RAIF, encompasses not only the refinancing of an existing portfolio of more than 65 properties but also the financing of targeted ESG measures to further optimize the portfolio. The borrowers are companies of the Amsterdam-based investment group Metroprop B.V., which has been active in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany for more than 45 years. With this most recent financing, Aukera’s total lending since its founding in July 2020 has now grown to EUR 1.36 billion.

The Netherlands real estate portfolio consists primarily of residential and commercial properties in excellent central locations in various cities and includes space leased to essential local providers such as supermarkets. More than half of the properties are in Amsterdam. Of the total rentable space of approx. 86,400 sq.m., almost all is leased out. The portfolio thus offers the fund’s institutional investors, which are German insurance companies, a high level of cash flow security. The strength of this senior secured financing is further boosted by the extensive expertise of Metroprop in Amsterdam as well as the planned improvements to many of the properties to make them more energy efficient and thus better as long-term investment holdings.

 “Our business relationship with Metroprop founder Jos van de Mortel goes back more than six years,” says Lars Armgart, Chief Executive Officer of Aukera Real Estate. “Even in challenging environments, the investor has repeatedly managed to strengthen this portfolio through targeted measures, thereby delivering stable performance. This excellent track record convinced us to support Metroprop yet again with this refinancing transaction.”

 “We are very pleased and satisfied that we have been able to refinance this portfolio in this way, without any negative cash flow impact, so that we can continue our strategy of investments that combine sustainability with good returns,” says Jos van de Mortel, founder and owner of Metroprop B.V. “In this respect, we are already among the leaders in the European market.”

Aukera Real Estate was advised on the transaction by the international law firm of Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner (BCLP) and by Voorhorst Van Waegeningh Advocaten in Utrecht. Metroprop was advised by Finway as legal counsel and by PolarReal Debt & Capital Advisory as financing advisor.

Three further pipeline deals totalling more than EUR 200 million

Aukera Real Estate anticipates three further transactions in the coming weeks, including the refinancing of a German object in the amount of EUR 30 million as well as financings of real estate portfolios in Luxembourg and the Netherlands with a combined amount in excess of EUR 175 million. These will be Aukera’s fifteenth, sixteenth and seventeenth transactions since its founding.

The owner-managed investment manager Aukera Real Estate AG, headquartered in Essen, made a significant leap forward in this year’s “Real Estate Capital Debt Fund 30” (REC 30) ranking. Following 25th place last year, the financing boutique now landed at position 19,by attaining capital commitments of more than 1.3 billion euros – entirely  from German institutional investors.

“We are proud that after such a short time we already rank among the top 20 of Europe’s alternative real estate lenders,” Aukera CIO Dr. Patrick Züchner said. “We offer borrowers first-class solutions even in a challenging market environment, and continue to  strengthen our position in real estate financing. This dynamic development is only possible thanks to our dedicated team, which has a joint history of more than ten years, building and  always justifying the trust our investors placed in us with capital commitments of such an amount,” says Aukera CEO Lars Armgart. This trust on the part of investors, but also borrowers and business partner, has “contributed significantly to our success”, Armgart added to express his thanks.

Essen-based owner-managed investment manager Aukera Real Estate AG has secured a new mandate for the real estate debt fund it advises. A German insurance company has provided capital commitments in the amount of EUR 150 million. The funds are to be invested in senior secured pan-European real estate loans with a conservative loan-to-value ratio of below 50 percent as part of a new investment strategy. 

The fund is structured as a Luxembourg S.C.A. SICAV RAIF and targets institutional investors from Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Under the “super-senior” strategy, the fund will invest in short-term, predominantly floating-rate, senior secured real estate loans in continental Europe as well as in the United Kingdom. The term of the mandate is seven years. 

Aukera Real Estate, founded in 2020, will advise the AIFM PANDOO Management over the entire investment period. The Essen-based investment boutique’s services range from deal sourcing to due diligence and acquisitions as well as ongoing support and monitoring until the loans are repaid. Hauck Aufhäuser Lampe Privatbank AG, Niederlassung Luxemburg acts as the fund’s custodian bank. 

Investors will participate in a structure tailored to German market requirements, while at the same time benefitting from a low-risk, pan-European strategy. With this new raise, Aukera has secured a total of over EUR 1.3 billion in capital commitments for managed mandates since 2020. Assets under management stood at EUR 1.01 billion as of the end of March. 

Markus Habbig, Head of Co-Investments at Aukera, says: “With the new strategy, we are broadening our investment universe and offering our clients the opportunity to invest broadly diversified in real estate loans from across Europe with a low risk-return profile. In the current volatile market environment, this conservative investment strategy offers the opportunity to invest in real-estate-secured loans with low loan-to-value ratios and to benefit from future interest rate developments.” 

Plans for a EUR 250 million pooled fund 

Aukera offers its services primarily for individual mandates, which can be implemented from as little as EUR 50 million. The Luxembourg umbrella fund structure is already in place and individual mandates can be set up quickly and efficiently for new clients. In addition, Aukera plans to launch its first ever pooled fund in 2023. It is expected to reach a target volume of EUR 250 million. 

Dutch real estate fund manager Annexum and debt fund advisor Aukera today announced that they have successfully arranged the refinancing of a portfolio consisting of supermarkets in the Netherlands. Annexum concluded a senior financing of EUR 38 million through a fund advised by Aukera. The purpose of the transaction was to refinance existing debt on the Dutch part of the portfolio of ‘German Dutch Supermarket Fund’.

The financed portfolio consists of twelve supermarkets in ten cities in the Netherlands. The assets span 25,200 sq. m and generate a gross rental income of c. EUR 4 million. The portfolio is with 99% highly occupied by a strong tenant mix of prominent supermarket and retail chains.

“This refinancing is an important milestone for the financial outlook of the fund and simultaneously offers a strong foundation for further growth”, says Ronald Jansen, partner at Annexum. “Supermarkets continue to be an attractive investment offering stable and long-term cash flows. We are very pleased to have completed this financing together with the experienced team of Aukera”, he concludes

In 2022, Aukera granted loans totaling of more than EUR 410 million and increased commitments of its funds to approximately EUR 1.2 billion. “Annexum takes an active approach to constantly optimize portfolios with strong cash flows. This highly matches with our own principled investment approach”, says Patrick Züchner, CIO Aukera. “At the same time, this financing further strengthens the presence of our team in the Netherlands, which has now been ongoing since 2015”, Lars Armgart, CEO Aukera adds.

In this transaction, Aukera was advised by Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner and Voorhorst Van Waegeningh Advocaten. Annexum was advised by CMS and PwC.