Signs are emerging that opportunistic investors are moving to take advantage of the disruption in the investment market during the pandemic. Both Moorgarth and Supermarket Income REIT have announced they are raising funds for new acquisitions.
Moorgarth Group is to launch a new £100m real estate fund to support community based retail and leisure projects across the UK.
The fund, which is backed by a number of Moorgarth’s existing investment partners, will look to buy assets, and partner with companies and local authorities who own real estate assets with values of £5m and upwards. The assets must offer essential services to the community and have the benefit of being within urban areas, not necessarily city or town centres, with the benefit of a food and convenience anchor and good parking.
Moorgarth chief executive Tim Vaughan said: “Our experiences within our existing portfolio of the importance of community engagement, and the successes that have come from that have demonstrated, if the assets are managed sympathetically and energetically they can assist with a much wider community support and regeneration objective.”
At the same time Supermarket Income REIT, the UK supermarket real estate investor, is to raise approximately £75m through an issue of shares in order to buy further assets. Chairman Nick Hewson said: “The ability of omnichannel supermarkets to supply the local communities they serve has never been more important than it is now in response to Covid-19. As a board, we are fortunate during these difficult times to be able to raise capital to offer liquidity to vendors of supermarkets who may need the proceeds for other purposes”.
