S&P Global Market Intelligence offers our top picks of U.S. real estate news stories and more published throughout the week.
Blackstone goes even bigger
* Blackstone Group Inc. attracted $20.5 billion in total capital commitments at the final close of Blackstone Real Estate Partners IX LP, making it the private equity giant's largest property fund to date.
Separately, Blackstone's Equity Office unit is looking to sell the 622,000-square-foot Park Avenue Tower at 65 East 55th St. in New York City for more than $800 million, The Real Deal reported, citing unnamed sources.
WeWork rings
* Coworking giant WeWork Cos. Inc.'s parent, The We Co., disclosed several changes to its proposed governance structure in response to market feedback ahead of its planned IPO. The company said any CEO who succeeds Adam Neumann will be selected by the board, acting as a group, and no member of Neumann's family will sit on the board. Neumann also agreed to give to the company any profits he receives from the property transactions he has entered into with the company.
The company noted that its class A common stock has been approved for listing on Nasdaq under the trading symbol WE.
Big-buck buys
* Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. is acquiring 15 luxury hotels across the U.S. from Anbang Insurance Group Co. Ltd. for more than US$5.8 billion, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing unnamed sources.
* Healthcare real estate investment trust HCP Inc. agreed to pay $332.5 million for a 224,000-square-foot life-sciences property
* Hines and the Hong Kong Monetary Authority purchased a 49% stake in the 755,900-square-foot Park Tower office property in San Francisco for about $534 million, the San Francisco Business Times reported, citing unnamed sources. Facebook Inc. earlier agreed to occupy the entire building, which was owned 95% by MetLife.
* A joint venture between Fallon Co. and Barings is looking to sell an 18-story office tower in Boston's Seaport District, hoping to receive bids of approximately $500 million, Real Estate Alert reported. One Marina Park Drive offers 492,000 square feet, with 19,000 square feet of retail space.
* Innovo Property Group and Hong Kong-based Nan Fung Group Holdings Ltd. agreed to buy Westbrook Partners LLC's approximately 90% stake in a warehouse property in Queens, N.Y., in a transaction that values the property at $430 million, The Real Deal reported, citing unnamed sources.
* Independent proxy advisory firms Institutional Shareholder Services Inc. and Glass Lewis & Co. LLC recommended that unit holders of Canada's Pure Multi-Family REIT LP approve the company's proposed sale to an affiliate of Cortland Partners LLC in a deal valued at approximately US$1.2 billion.
* Realogy Holdings Corp. rebuffed recent claims by rival real estate services provider Compass that the company held discussions to sell itself or merge with Compass, saying the claims by Compass are "designed to inspire sensational news coverage about Realogy that is simply not true."
Settlement
* VEREIT Inc. and its operating partnership signed a memorandum of understanding related to the settlement of a class-action suit brought against the single-tenant REIT, then known as American Realty Capital Properties Inc., related to financial misreporting in 2014 and 2015, with the cost to the company coming to approximately $765.5 million.
U.S. commercial real estate forecast
* According to the Pension Real Estate Association's third-quarter consensus forecast survey, the U.S. commercial real estate market is expected to see an average total return of 6.5% on the National Council of Real Estate Investment Fiduciaries Property Index across all property types in 2019.
Assessing the Dorian effect
* Several property companies, including Killam Apartment REIT, Independence Realty Trust Inc., Gladstone Land Corp., NexPoint Residential Trust Inc., DiamondRock Hospitality Co. and BRT Apartments Corp., said they suffered little or no damage because of Hurricane Dorian.
DiamondRock said property damage and construction delays were minimal. It expects the storm-related earnings disruption to be less than $1 million in hotel adjusted EBITDA for its portfolio.
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