Ashurst has advised on a planning application for the first development to be undertaken by Berkeley's new St Joseph division.

The section 106 agreement and planning permission for the residential led development in Wallingford, Oxfordshire were completed on 4 October 2017. The development will comprise 555 dwellings, including affordable housing and an extra care unit, a new primary school, sports pitches, allotments and other landscaping and open spaces, and new pedestrian and vehicular access links.

Watson Farley & Williams (“WFW”) has advised Commerz Real AG (“Commerz Real”) on its €45m acquisition of the Höcherberg wind farm on behalf of the closed-end special fund CR Institutional Renewable Energies Fund (“Special AIF”).

The wind farm, located in the Saarland region of Germany, comprises five separate wind energy plants with a total installed capacity of 16.5 MW and is scheduled to be connected to the grid by autumn 2017.

Macfarlanes has advised London-based investment firm, Hollyport Capital LLP, on the raising of its sixth fund, Hollyport Secondary Opportunities VI, which has closed at its hard cap of $500m.

This represents a significant increase in assets under management for Hollyport Capital and an increase on their fifth secondaries fund which closed in November 2015 with commitments of £187.5m. Hollyport Capital plans to continue its focus on the mature private equity secondaries market and has already completed a number of investments for the new fund.   

Clifford Chance has advised La Française Real Estate Partners International on its acquisition of an office complex in Stuttgart. The complex offers around 30,000 square metres of floor space.

The office complex is made up of two buildings located at Mittlerer Pfad 13-15 in Stuttgart and built in 1993 and 2001 respectively. The main building offers floor space of around 23,000 square metres and the secondary building around 7,000 square metres. Porsche is the lessee for both buildings and there are almost ten years remaining on the lease.

International law firm Hogan Lovells represented Fibra Uno, the first and one of the largest real estate investment trusts in Mexico, in a US$700 million follow-on equity offering.

The offering was oversubscribed, and consisted of the sale of 419.75 million of Fibra Uno’s Real Estate Trust Certificates (which includes an overallotment option) for the price of 30.50 Mexican pesos per real estate trust certificate.

Heuking Kühn Lüer Wojtek has assisted housing company VIVAWEST Wohnen GmbH (VIVAWEST) in the acquisition of “Mühlenquartier” in Düsseldorf-Benrath. A team comprised of professionals from several offices led by Düsseldorf-based partner Dr. Marc Scheunemann advised VIVAWEST comprehensively on the transaction.

Clifford Chance has advised a fund represented by BNP Paribas REIM, the OPPCI Vestas French Real Estate, whose investor is Vestas Investment Management, a Korean institutional investor, on the acquisition from Unibail-Rodamco and the financing of the building So Ouest Plaza, located in Levallois-Perret.

The net disposal price of the deal, which follows a sale agreement signed in February 2017, is €473.8 million.

The Commercial Real Estate team at international law firm DAC Beachcroft LLP has acted for Royal London on xxxx launch of a new £2.7 billion UK property fund.

The Royal London UK Real Estate Fund is the largest-ever UK property fund at launch and invests in commercial property across all major sectors (industrial, offices, retail warehouses, shopping centres) and regions. It is designed to provide domestic and foreign institutional investors exposure to the UK commercial real estate market.

Eversheds Sutherland has advised long-standing client Royal London Asset Management (RLAM) on the largest ever launch of a UK property fund, with portfolio worth over £2.7bn.

The European asset management enterprise Amundi Real Estate has acquired two hotel projects in Berlin. The vendor Anschutz Entertainment Group Real Estate will develop the entire district with a volume of EUR 200 million. International law firm Clifford Chance advised Amundi Real Estate on this transaction.

The projects acquired are three-star hotel Hampton by Hilton with 254 rooms and four-star hotel Indigo with 118 rooms. Both hotels, which are to open late in 2018, will be orperated by Austrian real estate agent Tristar on a 20-year lease.