Trei plans to integrate more institutional equity via joint venture structures in future

Trei Real Estate GmbH (“Trei”) will take a more proactive approach to forming joint ventures in the future. Within the framework of its joint venture structures, the company intends to collaborate with external partners to invest in property developments and to sell these upon completion. They could either be sold to the respective joint venture partner or be put on the market. The properties to be developed are supposed to be located in the three core markets of Trei – meaning in Germany, Poland and the United States. The plans focus primarily on residential real estate in the aforesaid markets, although Trei continues to see further opportunities for developing retail parks in Poland.

Pepijn Morshuis, the CEO of Trei Real Estate, commented: “At this time, we are examining and preparing a number of residential real estate developments in the United States, Poland and Germany, and we identified opportunities in all three of these markets. We want to speed up the process of scaling up this business line but need third-party capital to do so. For the coming year, we already identified six developments in our core markets that are particularly well-suited for partnership-based equity investments.”

Stephan Heinen, Head of Institutional Investment at Trei, added: “We are an equity-rich developer who is backed by a strong conglomerate. For the time being, we therefore remain unaffected by the crisis in the development market. In addition, we have a robust track record in the mentioned countries and asset classes. This inspires confidence and convinces institutional investors of our integrity.”

Morshuis added: “The approach itself is not entirely new for Trei: For the development of our Vendo Park retail parks in Poland, we already entered into a joint venture with Patron Capital that has an equity capital base of €50 million. In the summer of 2023, we set up a partnership with KINGSTONE Real Estate for the purpose of developing rental apartments in Poland within the framework of joint venture structures. Furthermore, we sold a residential project in Mainz to a German institutional investor via a forward deal in June 2022. We would welcome opportunities to engage in comparable projects again in the future.”

Overall, Trei has 5,900 residential units under development today. The figure breaks down into 1,400 units in Germany, another 2,200 in the United States and 2,300 in Poland. In a parallel move, the company will probably open another two retail parks in Poland in addition to the four Vendo Parks it already opened, while a further 14 Vendo Parks are in the development pipeline.