The deal involves two buildings purchased by The Edge Group approximately a year ago: the 24 de Julho building, in Santos, and the D. Luís building, beside Cais do Sodré. The transaction with Rockspring was based on a model of “partnership for the development” of regeneration projects, in other words, the new owner joins as a partner, financing part of the cost of the project, agreeing to purchase the two buildings once the works are concluded.
“The Portuguese market is indeed conducive to the entry of foreign capital and we received offers from several funds, among which Spanish, German and English. But some only wanted to join at the end of the works, purchasing the buildings after the regeneration is complete. We ended up selecting Rockspring’s proposal, which presented a more interesting model and enables us to leverage capital and plan other investments”, explained the CEO.
Purchased in July 2015 from Parvalorem (a public company created to recover former claims of the bankrupt BPN), the 24 de Julho building was an auto silo which was closed twenty years ago and will be converted for office use, in a project estimated at 20 million euros (including purchase and construction works), aimed to be completed in the first semester of 2017. The approximately 10.000 m² already have guaranteed occupancy, assigned to the multinational advertising corporation WPP, according to the newspaper Expresso, and were sold to Rockspring for 25 million euros.
Currently in a more advanced phase, regeneration of the D. Luís building should be concluded this September, with 75% of its 10.000 m² already taken up, “and it should be 100% occupied by the end of the year”, states the group’s CEO. Located on Rua do Instituto Industrial, the building was purchased from Millennium bcp last October for 16 million euros, plus another four million in regeneration works; it was now sold to Rockspring for 28 million euros.