Géant for the giant
One of the largest transaction of its kind in recent years in Poland is still in progress – GE Real Estate has become the owner of 16 Géant hypermarkets, previously belonging to the Casino Group. Géant will still be the anchor tenant of the buildings, but with the retail operations taken over by the Metro Group in the next few months. GE RE has now become the owner of all Géant’s former properties, the total value of which is EUR 555 mln.Karim Habra, managing director of GE Real Estate Central Europe, talked to ‘Eurobuild’ about the details of this acquisition and the company’s plans for Poland
Tomasz Cudowski, ‘Eurobuild Poland’: – Could you give us some idea of how long the negotiations lasted and how they proceeded?
We intend to finish the process in September, so we are now at the stage of finalizing the documents.
What are the greatest difficulties you face?
Clearly, both transactions had an impact on each other.
What aspects of this group’s operations will be managed by GE RE on its own and what kind of services will be outsourced?
The first important deal in Poland was the acquisition in 2003 of gallery space in 13 shopping centres belonging to Casino and Apsys, and now – as part of the most recent transaction – we added to this the hypermarkets in 16 shopping centres. That’s the reason why our recent deal has a very strategic importance for us, as it enables us to own 100 pct of many properties. In the meantime, we have sold 4 of the original 13 galleries, so actually we own 9 galleries plus 9 hypermarkets in the same buildings as well as 7 other hypermarkets. We own also 3 office buildings in Warsaw, 2 logistic centres and another shopping centre.
What is their total space and value?
We want to continue to grow – this is our priority. We want also to diversify our portfolio. The majority of our assets are retail properties, but we are interested in office buildings and logistic centres. We are analysing the residential market too. We will continue to focus on large portfolio transactions across the region.
What contracts are you now working on in Poland?
It’s very difficult to predict that, but I believe yields will continue to go down, because they are still high compared to the European average. But I believe Poland will still be a very attractive country to invest in real estate, especially in the retail and office market.
Does the proposed ban on Sunday trading in Poland worry GE RE at all?
