It has been five months since Meridia RE IV fund, the last investment managed by Meridian Capitalclosed a new purchase: two adjacent office buildingsat numbers 21 and 23 On Milanesat street, in the Sarriá district, one of the most luxurious districts in all of Barcelona that it pays for 19 million €,
Even though they only paid 18.5 million for now, The transaction was financed with equityfrom the capital increase of the fund established as a Socimi (Public Limited Company for Real Estate Investment) for tax purposes and traded on the French stock exchange Euronext Access Paris.
The real estate and venture capital firm of Catalan businessman and former head of FC Barcelona, Javier Faus, closed the operation just days ago, on 9 May. new property now start a reform known in the industry “brown to green”, with the intention of real estate having certifications in terms of sustainability and ESG standards. Meridia will not have to incur a large capital outlay or undergo extensive rehabilitation as the buildings are in good condition.
At least until January 2022, the tenants of these offices included the creative and strategic consulting company K-Factor, the Mur Arquitectura studio or the ICR ophthalmology center, taking into account the information badge located at the entrance of the buildings.
From Meridia they state: Very high demand for offices in Sarriá and supply remains very limited”: “This makes this deal a great opportunity to further consolidate our position in the most valuable office market in Barcelona”.
The last purchase of Meridia’s number four real estate fund was an industrial building they paid for in the [email protected] neighborhood of Barcelona. 9.2 million €. The goal of the Faus manager is to transform it into a state-of-the-art office building, in a location that has seen a lot of demand and development in recent years.
Barcelona office market
In 2022, Barcelona became the second most traveled city after Madrid. investment office market, total 950 million and 23 operationsaccounted for 37% of the total. Real estate consultancy Savills notes in an annual comparison that “the Barcelona market has shrunk by 45%, but it should not be forgotten that the scarcity of open sales processes in Madrid has turned investor appetite into the Catalan market”. One of the reasons for the drop in transaction volume was that five operations were closed for over €100 million in 2021 and only two operations were closed last year.
Regarding space contracting, the market has remained very solid throughout 2022 and 325,000 square meters for rentA figure very similar to 2021. On the contrary, Savills is not very positive about the number that can be recorded this year: “Approximately 293,000 square meters of inflow are expected during 2023, an unforeseen volume since 2008. • Only 9.7% of this area has already been committed. It is explained by the high availability fueled by the large new and rehabilitated vacant offer (113,000 m²) included in stock in 2022. In 2024, the development level will be maintained with an estimated 265,000 m² more, almost 100% usable”.