September 2, 2009
Palmer Capital Partners Limited (Palmer Capital) is delighted to announce the launch of The Palmer GVA Property Fund LP (the Fund), with equity raised from both institutional and private investors. This is believed to be one of the few private property funds that have successfully closed this year and has a gross fund size of £160m once fully invested.
The fund, launched in joint venture with GVA Grimley Limited is the first new fund of its type to be launched for many months in the UK. The fund was oversubscribed, and has closed with equity raised of c.£80m. The fund is a five year closed ended vehicle and will purchase assets with long dated income streams to good covenants in good locations. The fund will buy lot sizes of up to £10m, and will source its deals through a combination of the property companies in which Palmer Capital is invested as well as GVA Grimley and other agents.
The investors in the fund include clients of ING Real Estate, Aviva Investors and Henderson Global Investors. It also includes c.£7m of private investor money, of which £2m has been invested personally by directors of Palmer Capital and GVA Grimley.
Alex Price, Chief Executive of Palmer Capital said: “We are delighted to close this fund in such a challenging fund raising environment. In March we predicted on the front page of Property Week the bottom of the market for this type of stock, and since then the market has confirmed our judgement. This fund will aim to capitalise on the market cycle that should see property increase in value over the next 5 years from what will seem an historic low today.”
Rob Bould Chairman of GVA Grimley Capital Markets said: “We are very pleased to have worked with Palmer Capital in the establishment of this new Fund and notwithstanding the current low volume of transactions in the market we are already seeing interesting opportunities that will fulfil our buying criteria”.