Colliers CRE will spend up to half of the £15m it is to raise through a share issue on buying six or seven property agencies in the UK.
Announcing plans for the rights issue, the company said it was in talks with a number of companies and expected to have some deals finalised by the end of the year.
Chief executive David Izett said: “We should be announcing acquisitions and new fund launches by the end of the year. A number of these acquisitions are companies we have been in talks with for some time. These are not fantasies.”
The company said it would use around £7m to invest in UK acquisitions, roughly £3m to drive its expansion in continental Europe — where it was looking to establish a presence in the major Western European countries — and the remainder of the cash to launch new funds through Colliers Capital and its co-investment vehicle, Deanwater Estates.
Colliers currently owns a 56% share in its Spanish affiliate and a 60% share in its Irish operation.
The strategy is part of the company’s plans to double in size over the next five years.
Under its model of paying for acquisitions through a combination of cash, shares and future payments, the £7m allocation should give it total spending power of up to £12m.
The company is making the share offer at 140p, around 30% below the closing price of 211p on Wednesday, the day before it made its announcement. It expects to place the new shares with both existing and new shareholders.
