Swiss Life Asset Managers France completes the sale of a retail portfolio in France that was nearing maturity
A look back at the fund’s performance
Created in 2009, club deal - targeting an institutional French clientele - specialising in retail property, comprised at its launch a portfolio of food retailers. A second portfolio of food shops and shopping malls completed the fund two years later, bringing it to EUR 160m in assets. Since 2018, the fund had refocused on the food market and sold its shopping malls. The fund is now nearing maturity and all 26 properties in France have been sold.
“This successful sale confirms the acquisition strategy implemented for the fund and demonstrates the ability of our management teams to sell a portfolio in a complex market environment,” stresses Fabrice Lombardo, Head Real Estate Operations at Swiss Life Asset Managers France.
Our desire, “to be as close as possible to the consumer”
Swiss Life Asset Managers France intends to continue its investments in the retail sector.
“Our choice of investments is based on research into customer proximity. Our conviction in retail investment is based on three types of asset: high street retail, peripheral retail areas and urban logistics,” says Julien Ganier, MRICS Head Third-Party Portfolio Management Real Estate at Swiss Life Asset Managers France. As such, high street retail naturally appears central to consumer proximity, it is also at the heart of experience shopping, a key element in customer retention. Another consumer area, retail on the urban periphery is close to a growing peri-urban population, with 70% of French people now living on the outskirts of the city(1). Finally, e-commerce is a constituent part of consumption patterns. As the last link in the chain and given its key role in e-commerce, we naturally associate urban logistics with our vision of the retail sector.
(1) Source :Observatoire des territoires 2021-2022, ANCT.