Blackstone has also committed to buy a portion of the stake directly from Contera, with Blackstone holding a majority stake in its industrial portfolio after the transaction closes. Contera will remain a minority shareholder, property manager and developer. This is stated in the developer's current press release. Contera perceives the entry of the capital company Blackstone as another opportunity for the development of its portfolio, according to Dušan Kastl, the executive director of Contera.
Warehouse properties have been Blackstone's largest real estate investment for more than a decade, with the asset class now accounting for around 60% of its European and 40% of its global real estate portfolio, according to Bloomberg. The firm continued to rapidly deploy capital into the sector even as property markets struggled to recover from the interest rate shock, betting that rents would continue to rise. Of the 5 billion dollars that the company has invested in Europe this year, approximately half is in warehouses.
"Logistics continues to benefit from strong growth in demand from users and investors, supported by the development of e-commerce. These high-quality properties complement our existing pan-European portfolio and allow us to benefit from further growth,” says James Seppala, head of European real estate at Blackstone."Strategic areas for us are Prague, Ostrava and Bratislava. During our existence, we have created a portfolio of industrial real estate with a value of more than 500 million euros. When developing new industrial zones, we emphasize the revitalization of brownfields. Nominally, it makes up more than 85 percent of our portfolio," adds Contera CEO Tomáš Jirků.
