Allianz Real Estate, acting on behalf of several Allianz companies, in a 50-50 joint venture with Charter Hall Group managed wholesale fund CPIF, has signed the Sale & Purchase Agreement to acquire an Australian logistics portfolio of 4 ALDI Distribution Centers for AUD648m. The settlement for the transaction is expected in June 2020.
The assets, which are located in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane, were designed and built by ALDI to a high-quality specification and sold with 7-year lease backs plus multiple 7-year renewal options.
The Sydney logistic facilities are located within prime industrial locations of Minchinbury and Prestons within the Outer West and South West suburbs of Sydney, whilst the Melbourne facility is located at Dandenong Sand the Brisbane asset located at Brendale.
“This transaction is in line with our strategy of aligning our investments to secular mega trends in the Asia-Pacific region. Demand for logistics in Australia is underpinned by growth in e-commerce, increasing international trade and the resilience of non-discretionary retail spending. This will provide our investors an attractive distribution yield.” said Rushabh Desai, Asia Pacific CEO of Allianz Real Estate. “We value our long-standing relationship with Charter Hall, and we are very excited to partner with them on the acquisition of the ALDI logistics portfolio. ALDI is known to us in Germany and we are pleased to broaden the relationship with them.”
“We are delighted to once again extend our cross-sector relationship with ALDI who will become a sizeable cross sector tenant customer. Further, combining the balance sheet strength of CPIF and its partner Allianz Real Estate gave Charter Hall a competitive advantage in convincing ALDI that we could deliver an unconditional executed transaction within a short timeframe, having recently secured FIRB approval for the transaction.” said David Harrison, CEO and Managing Director of Charter Hall. “The on-going growth and resilience of grocery retailing in Australia is consistent with our strategic focus in growing our Industrial and Logistics portfolio toward AUD 10 billion and beyond.”
Allianz Real Estate‘s assets under management in the region amounted to EUR 5.5 billion as at the end of 2019. The Asia-Pacific business is headquartered in Singapore.
