Property entrepreneur and hotelier Surinder Arora has agreed a deal to buy £309m of assets from the Airport Property Partnership, a joint venture between BAA and Morley, in one of the biggest investment transactions to complete this year.
Through the Arora Family Trust (AFT), Arora first signed up to buy some of the portfolio earlier this year, as tipped by Property Week 29.02.08.
He has now completed a deal on £236m of property, or 30 assets, and has agreed to purchase a further three properties for £73m when they are built later this year, bringing the total to £309m.
The funding for the deal has been provided by Bank of Ireland Corporate Banking, Abbey National Treasury Services and AIB Group.
Arora said: ‘This is a significant asset consolidation which will bolster the business plans we have for Heathrow, Gatwick and other UK airports.’
Arora also recently bought around 60 acres of land near Heathrow from Surrey County Council, and his hotel company, Arora International Hotels, has just opened a Sofitel at London Heathrow's Terminal 5.
The baa and Morley portfolio includes assets such as the Compass Centre, where BAA is headquartered, as well as development sites.
Mark Manners, property director of Arora Management Services, whose team acted for AFT, said: ‘In the current climate and with the credit crunch almost daily in the news, we have been successful in assisting the directors of the AFT to raise finance to complete a property transaction of this size.’
The remainder of the Airport Property Partnership - valued last summer at £1.1bn in total - remains on the market and it is thought that talks with lead bidder ProLogis are ongoing, however market conditions are making the conclusion of the sale difficult.
