Palatium duo Keith Davidson and James Tarry have joined Cordea Savills to lead its entry into the European real estate debt market.
The pair, who have 25 years’ combined banking experience and worked together at Eurohypo before moving to debt specialists Palatium, have been appointed as co-heads of debt investment at Cordea Savills.
The investment manager is establishing a debt team to manage a real estate lending platform with a view to transact new senior and subordinated lending as well as acquire performing and non-performing loans.
One of the first initiatives will see them working closely with the team of the Prime London Residential Development Fund, which was launched in October 2011.
The new team will also create investment vehicles to provide new investment finance, or to acquire existing financing arrangements, at attractive risk-adjusted rates of return.
Justin O’Connor, Cordea Savills chief executive, said: “The debt funding gap is likely to continue in the medium term. It was not unexpected that more money was raised for debt funds in Europe in the third quarter of last year than for equity funds.”
Davidson said: “Cordea Savills has an excellent brand, investor relationships and direct real estate expertise. This creates a powerful platform on which we can leverage our experience and maximise opportunities to raise and deploy capital successfully.”
Tarry said: “We are delighted to be joining a company with the resources and ambition to make a real impact in a market that we know extremely well and which has huge potential going forward.”
bridget.oconnell@estatesgazette.com
