FINANCE: Legal & General Property is tapping existing investors in its £1bn Industrial Property Investment Fund for an additional £65m of equity over the summer.
The capital raise is the result of demand from investors to boost their allocations to the fund, said Dan Batterton, head of UK product development at LGP.
IPIF, which merged with the £100m Falcon Property Unit Trust at the end of last year, is the UK’s largest industrial property fund. The vehicle returned 25.5% in the 12 months to the end of June this year.
The fund underwent restructuring in July last year that converted it to a semi-open-ended structure, extended its life until 2020 and included provision for further capital raising.
LGP’s decision to raise more money from investors is a sign of market demand for vehicles that “blur the boundary between open and closed-ended funds”, said John Forbes, independent consultant and former head of European real estate at PwC.
The news of the capital raise follows LGP’s announcement on 23 July of the refinancing of £350m of debt in IPIF with RBS, Wells Fargo and L&G’s lending arm, LGIM Commercial Lending.
sophia.furber@estatesgazette.com
