We advised AEW, the German real estate investment manager, together with Yester & Morrow on the purchase of a residential portfolio consisting of 90 fully let apartments in the Helsinki Metropolitan Area. The properties were acquired from the Bank of Åland Residential Property Fund.
The transaction was carried out as two share deals via an open-ended AIF, set up by AEW Invest GmbH in 2019. The fund is tailored to the needs of a German institutional supplementary pension fund investing in pan-European assets. To secure delivery in an ambitious timeframe, AEW’s international advisory team ensured the equal tax treatment of the German AIF with Finnish funds via a binding ruling from the tax authorities.
Lars-Henning Pylla, Separate Account Fund Manager at AEW, says: ‘Finland is one of the most competitive economies in the world, underpinned by the strength of the Helsinki Metropolitan Area, which is one of the main reasons we took the decision to broaden the mandate’s residential exposure and to invest into this dynamic region.’
AEW is one of the world’s largest real estate asset managers, with EUR 67.6 billion of assets under management as at 31 March 2019. AEW has over 700 employees, with its main offices located in Boston, London, Paris and Hong Kong. It offers a wide range of real estate investment products including commingled funds, separate accounts and securities mandates across the full spectrum of investment strategies. AEW represents the real estate asset management platform of Natixis Investment Managers, one of the largest asset managers in the world.
In Europe, AEW manages EUR 31.8 billion of real estate assets on behalf of a number of funds and separate accounts as at 31 March 2019. AEW has 400 employees based in 9 offices across Europe and has a long track record of successfully implementing core, value-add and opportunistic investment strategies on behalf of its clients. In the last five years, AEW has invested and divested a total volume of over EUR 20 billion of real estate across European markets.
With offices in Frankfurt and Hamburg, Yester & Morrow completed its market entry in June 2019. The firm aims at offering seamless advice throughout the lifecycle of an investment. Based on traditional values and a high professional standard, the work results are combined with an integrated legal tech approach, providing user-centered, value-added services, in a sustainable and resource-efficient environment.
