Lend Lease Investment Management yesterday successfully launched an new unlisted property vehicle, Core Plus Fund, raising around $205 million in equity subscriptions from institutional investors.
Core Plus has an initial investment capacity of around $330 million.
The fund will source product both from the external market and through Lend Lease’s asset creation pipeline. It will initially have six assets with a total value of approximately $168 million.
Following strong investor support during a six week equity raising Lend Lease Investment Management will not seek further equity until the initial raising has been fully invested.
Global CEO Lend Lease Investment Management, Steve McCann said the Core Plus Fund will complement the Group’s existing fund offering by targeting niche assets in traditional sectors and nontraditional sectors such as hotels, retirement villages and car parks. The Fund will target a minimum annual return of 10%.
McCann said Core Plus extends the Lend Lease fund offering across the risk/return spectrum for our wholesale investor base. It has been created in recognition of our investors’ appetite for this type of investment.
“We are utilising Lend Lease’s dedicated capital transaction, asset creation, securitisation and asset management capabilities to create a portfolio of discrete funds with an attractive performance outlook.
“We have aligned Lend Lease’s interests with those of the Fund investors by taking an initial 10% coinvestment in the Fund,” McCann said.
Three of the initial assets in Core Plus have been sourced from the Lend Lease pipeline. These are two retirement villages that will be managed by Retirement By Design, Lend Lease’s senior living division, and CS Square, a retail centre at Caroline Springs, a Delfin Lend Lease development, which is being jointly acquired with the APPF Retail Fund.
McCann concluded that the further retirement and other property assets in the Lend Lease pipeline and externally have been identified by the Group’s capital transactions team as potential investments for the Core Plus Fund.
By Adam Parsons
