66% of investors who participated in Expo Real in Munich in the autumn of 2018 consider European properties to be attractive. And they also want to buy more. The most interest is in residential areas (rental apartments or student housing), logistics, health care facilities and nursing homes - often category B, i.e. older buildings. The news is that the American company, Blackstone Group, will set up its largest ever real estate fund. They wants to raise at least $18 billion from investors.
Blackstone is already a private equity real estate investor. According to Bloomberg, the strategy of the new fund is to invest in problematic properties around the world, as was the case with their previous fund which received a total of $15.8 billion from investors in 2015.
Blackstone want to raise capital at a time when institutions, such as public pension and insurance companies, are focusing on real estate. They want to protect themselves from inflation and expand their assets in shares and bonds. According to Preqin, the number of investors who are capable of investing $1 billion is growing.
Blackstone entered the real estate business in 1991, and its assets are worth $119 billion today. They own hotels, office buildings, shopping centres, industrial properties and apartment buildings in the US, Europe, Asia and Latin America.
Blackstone, together with the British company, Round Hill Capital, own 43,000 rental apartments in the Czech Republic, mainly in the Moravian-Silesian Region through its subsidiary company, Residomo (formerly RPG Apartments). Until 2016, Blackstone also owned the Hilton Prague Old Town, which they sold to an investment group from Singapore.
