Forum Equity Partners Raises $125m for its Real Estate Impact Fund

Dec 17, 2021 | News

Forum Equity Partners launched REIIF with a $125m capital raise. The funds will be used to acquire a $240m seed portfolio of residential rental real estate across Canada in REIIF’s targeted multi-family asset types and geographies.

“REIIF capitalizes on the growing demand for residential rental real estate, helping to address housing affordability that has been made challenging by population growth and increasing housing prices across Canada,” said Aly Damji, Partner – Real Estate. “With a focus on high-growth sectors of multi-family apartments, PBSA, and co-living communities in supply-constrained Canadian markets, REIIF is supplying sustainable, desirable, and convenient accommodations to a wide variety of tenants,” Mr. Damji continued.

“The seed portfolio, with properties located in Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal, and Vancouver, offers attractive cash flow and growth prospects with a lower risk profile than other real assets given how the portfolio has been designed and constructed,” said Rajeev Viswanathan, CFO and Partner. “In addition, REIIF benefits from a spread between an attractive property yield and low cost of debt capital achieved through CMHC insured property mortgages,” Mr. Viswanathan added.

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The Daily Mail was established in 1896 by Rothermere’s great grandfather. It listed on the stock market in 1932, and in the decades since has added a stable of other newspaper and magazine titles, including the Metro and the i alongside the Mail and the Mail on Sunday.

The Daily Mail last year supplanted Rupert Murdoch’s Sun as the UK’s top-selling newspaper, a title the latter had held since 1978. However, Rothermere is thought to be focused on an increasingly digital future.

The Daily Mail’s website, which has a more celebrity-oriented approach than its print equivalent, is one of the world’s most visited news websites.

Rothermere made his first move in July, with a 251p per share offer. However, he increased the price to 270p per share at the start of the month, valuing the newspaper business at £885m including debt.

The co-founder of DMGT’s largest independent shareholder, Lindsell Train, had on Wednesday indicated his support of the offer, despite the objections of some other large investors who argued Rothermere had valued the company too cheaply.

Majedie Asset Management and JO Hambro Capital Management have previously opposed earlier offers but now face the prospect of either selling up or rejecting it, leaving them with a hard-to-sell minority interest in a private company.

Under stock market rules Rothermere had to make the same offer to all shareholders when trying to gain majority control. Many equity fund managers are not allowed to hold illiquid stakes in private companies, which are also difficult to value.

Source: Yahoo Finance

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