What a difference a year makes. Investment in Dublin’s real estate market hit over €6B in 2022, supercharged by a number of landmark deals. This year’s total will likely be less than a third of that.
That overall 2022 figure was dominated by three acquisitions: the sale to Brookfield of Hibernia REIT for nearly €1.1B, plus the deals for the €500M European headquarters of Salesforce — now open and occupied — and a substantial portion of Meta’s Dublin 4 campus for €395M.
With investment turnover expected to struggle to hit €1.8B by the end of 2023, the lowest level since 2013, the picture for the top 12 deals of the year tells its own story.
Higher interest rates, a surge in inflation and constricted debt markets have hampered any attempts among the braver players in the real estate market to push through big deals, and the market consensus appears to be that 2024 will offer much the same until the gap between buyer and seller expectations begins to close.
But enough with the “Bah! Humbug!” With data compiled from the Dublin offices of JLL, CBRE and Colliers, here is the annual look at Ireland’s top 12 deals of the year.
Ingka’s deal at Greenogue reflected the need for retailers to be closer to the Irish consumer.
12. 87-88 Harcourt Street, Dublin 2
The 53K SF Dublin offices of law firm Byrne Wallace had a roller coaster ride to deal completion. It initially guided in 2022 at €45M, but after a lease extension and rent increase, the receivers set the asking price at €52M. However, when German investor AM Alpha withdrew its €43M offer, the asking price dropped to €37M in February, and French investor Corum Asset Management eventually paid €34M at a yield of 6.55%.
11. Rosemount Business Park And Airport Business Park, Dublin
KKR and Palm Capital completed the €41M purchase of 357K SF of industrial and logistics space split between unit D1 at Airport Business Park and units 1A and 1B at Rosemount Business Park in Dublin. The amount paid to vendor Iput equates to a price of nearly €115 per SF at a yield of 4.96%. Unit D1 is 92K SF and is let to DHL, while Units 1A and 1B total 273K SF and are let to retailer Dunnes Stores and LinkedIn.
10. Blackwater And City East Retail Parks, Multiple Locations
U.S. investor Realty Income Corp. entered the Irish market in July, paying Eden Capital €46M at an 8.45% yield for CityEast Retail Park in Limerick and Blackwater Retail Park in Navan, County Meath. Eden Capital had acquired the retail parks in 2020 and 2021. City East is 100% occupied and comprises 179K SF across seven units. Tenants include B&Q, Harvey Norman, EZ Living and Homesavers. Blackwater is also fully let across 138K SF and eight units, with tenants including Woodies and Currys.
9. Waterside, Citywest Business Campus, Dublin
In March, Bisnow caught up with the buyers after Fine Grain Property paid €65.5M to Iput for Waterside at Dublin’s Citywest Business Campus at a yield of 7.1%. Grosvenor Diversified Property Investments made its debut in Ireland after investing €40M alongside Fine Grain in FGPO Ireland Fund III, focused on workplaces in business parks across Ireland. The five Grade A suburban office blocks extend to approximately 219K SF with 973 car parking spaces. It is leased to tenants like SAP, Fidelity, Glanbia and Astellas Pharma. The site also has planning permission for approximately 180K SF of additional Grade A office space.
Courtesy of Abrdn
Roselawn was Abrdn’s first BTR acquisition in Dublin.
8. Roselawn, Dublin
Abrdn’s Pan European Residential Property Fund completed the purchase of Roselawn, a multifamily/build-to-rent scheme in Dublin, for €70M in March. Bisnow spoke with Abrdn in March about the first BTR asset purchased by the fund in Dublin, which was acquired on a forward-commitment basis from Richmond Homes. Roselawn is a development of 142 units in the south Dublin suburb of Blackrock, providing a mix of one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments. Tenant amenities include a lounge, a gym and coworking facilities.
7. The Hexagon Portfolio
This year’s biggest retail deal, featured as part of a major Bisnow retail report, was the €74M acquisition of the Hexagon portfolio, a collection of six regional shopping centres built by developer Harcourt Developments, in July by Davy Real Estate. The portfolio consists of the 70K SF Donaghmede Shopping Centre in Dublin, the 38K SF Letterkenny Shopping Centre in Donegal, the 177K SF Galway Shopping Centre, the 161K SF Laois Shopping Centre in Portlaoise, Limerick’s 77K SF Parkway Shopping Centre, and the 27K SF Longwalk Shopping Centre in Dundalk. The price paid by Davy represented an 11% yield. At the same time, it acquired the Marshes Shopping Centre in Dundalk from U.S. real estate firm Kennedy Wilson for about €29.5M.
6. Social Housing Portfolio, County Dublin
U.S. investor Franklin Templeton paid circa €75M in November to acquire a portfolio of 156 apartments in Dublin. Developed by Kouchin Holdings, the units are distributed across five new social housing schemes in Deansgrange, Dún Laoghaire, Donnybrook and Clondalkin, with the price representing an average of just under €481K per unit. The Joinery is the largest of the five developments, located at Baker’s Point in Deansgrange and comprising a total of 78 apartments over six floors along with two ground-floor retail units of 6,500 SF in total.
5. George’s Quay House, Townsend Street, Dublin 2
Having first entered the Irish market in 2016, French investor Corum Asset Management was one of the year’s most active actors and grew its Irish portfolio to 21 properties with an overall value of circa €575M in July when it acquired George’s Quay House and the F1 Building in Cherrywood (see No. 12) for €81M and €30M, respectively. Corum purchased George’s Quay House, which spans five floors and was upgraded in 2016, at a yield of 6.24% from UK-based Henderson Park, under whose ownership it was part of a €400M portfolio of former Green REIT Dublin properties Henderson was looking to sell. The 105K SF multitenant building forms part of the wider George’s Quay development and includes Fidelity and CIB among its tenants.
Courtesy of M&G European Living Property Fund
International investors are growing their presence in Dublin’s rental sector.
4. Eglinton Place, Donnybrook, Dublin 4
In February, Bisnow spoke with M&G’s European Living Property Fund after it paid €99.5M in February for the forward purchase of a portfolio of 148 apartments at Eglinton Place in Donnybrook, Dublin 4. M&G launched the fund in early January with €578M of equity, including €400M from MN, one of the largest pension administrators and managers of Dutch pension funds. The upscale build-to-rent scheme is being built by Irish developer Richmond Homes, and the development’s one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments include communal lounges, rooftop gardens, a gym, 208 bicycle spaces and external amenity space. The price represented a yield of 3.95%.
3. Opus, 6 Hanover Quay, Dublin 2
Zara founder Amancio Ortega’s property vehicle, Pontegadea, which also completed the year’s biggest deal, made its initial move into the Irish commercial property market at the end of March with the €101M, 4.25%-yield acquisition of 120 apartments at Opus, 6 Hanover Quay in Dublin’s south docklands. The development is located beside the Bord Gais Energy Theatre and includes two restaurants. Two-bedroom apartments rent from €4K a month. Mackenzie’s, a restaurant owned by Press Up Hospitality Group, and Staple Foods are on the ground floor. The deal matched what New York-based vendor TPG Angelo Gordon and local partner Carysfort Capital had paid developer Cairn Homes in 2019.
2. Buildings 1 And 2, Greenogue Logistics Park
Ingka Investments, the investment arm of Ikea parent Ingka Group, paid about €110M at a 3.9% yield to KKR and real estate private equity specialist Palm Capital for two of the three warehouses at Greenogue Logistics Park in Rathcoole, County Dublin. The acquisition by Ingka Investments was part of the company’s strategy to invest in distribution and logistics real estate in major cities where Ingka Group operates, the company told Bisnow earlier this year. The deal comprised Buildings 1 and 2 at Greenogue Logistics Park, a newly built property with green credentials of A2 Building Energy Rating and LEED Silver certification. The development consists of three units extending to a gross external floor area of nearly 455K SF. It is let to Tosca, Fastway and Wincanton, Ikea’s distribution partner.
1. Baldonnell Business Park, Phase 2
The biggest deal of 2023 was completed toward the year’s end in November, as Pontegadea paid circa €225M at a reported 4.85% yield for a major logistics investment at Dublin’s Baldonnell Business Park. Given the year the office sector endured, it is perhaps appropriate that the top deal of the year from Mountpark for the scheme’s second phase was not only a logistics transaction but also Ireland’s biggest ever in the sector. Pontegadea now owns circa 1.2M SF of logistics space at Baldonnell across five units, led by 650K SF occupied by Amazon, DB Schenker’s 134K SF, Home Store + More’s 88K SF, DSV’s 73K SF and Rexel/Kellihers Electrical’s 97K SF.
