In March 2020, REIT Lar España placed on the market the 22 Eroski supermarket portfolio it acquired in 2017 for around 48 million euro. The company stopped the operation for a few months due to the uncertainty generated by the pandemic, but given the interest of large investors in this type of property, it has decided to reactivate it, and the Consultant Cushman & Wakefield was selected to handle the sale according to Expansión.
This sale is part of Lar España’s already announced strategy of focusing on its shopping centre portfolio. In order to follow this strategy, the company has been selling mature non-strategic assets, a category that includes this portfolio.
The British fund was born in March of last year with more than 1,250 million of capital committed to invest in real estate assets in Europe. Since then, it has acquired several logistics assets in Denmark, Poland and Scotland.
According to Expansion, there are others interested in the operation, which is still in the negotiation phase and could take weeks to close.
Supermarkets in sale
Of the 22 assets that Lar España has put on the market, ten are in the Basque Country, seven are located in the Balearic Islands, two in Navarra, another two in Cantabria and one in La Rioja.
In total, this commercial portfolio has a total leasable area of about 28,000 sqm and the lease contract expires in March 2031.
In 2020, investment in supermarkets in Spain stands at about 640 million euros, according to Savills Aguirre Newman, 460 million more than in 2019. Mercadona, Carrefour and Sagax have closed the most important operations.
