At stake are four projects in the construction phase and four in the licensing phase, all in the residential segment.
Sonae Sierra is investing 700 million euros in eight real estate development projects, which, along with investment management, is a new area for the company, previously focused on the shopping center business.
Speaking at a meeting with journalists in Maia, in the district of Porto, the CEO of Sonae Sierra said that the company is in a “new cycle of growth”, based on a transversal and multinational operation in the real estate sector, promoting and managing investments and services from residential to offices, retail and leisure.
“Today Sonae Sierra is much more than shopping centers. It is a multinational company that operates in an integrated way in the real estate sector, an investment manager, a real estate developer and a real estate services manager”, emphasized Fernando Guedes de Oliveira.
Strong commitment to residential
With projects carried out in more than 35 countries and teams established in 11 countries, the real estate arm of the Sonae group, which will be 24 years in business in 2024, currently manages around 7,000 million euros in assets, 25% of which are outside shopping centers, and is currently investing 700 million euros in eight urban projects (four in the construction phase, representing 40% of the investment, and four in the licensing phase, all in the residential segment, one in Lisbon, two in Porto and the other in Bucharest).
One of the projects underway is the construction of the so-called Colombo North Tower in Lisbon, the third office building adjacent to the shopping center of the same name, which, with nine floors and 35,000 square meters of gross construction area, represents an investment of 118 million euros.
According to Sierra’s CEO, the project is being promoted in partnership with the French insurance group Axa, which in May will buy a 74% stake in this real estate project, scheduled for completion by the end of 2025.
And if, until now, Sonae Sierra’s focus in the residential area has been on the medium/high segment, Fernando Guedes de Oliveira guarantees that the company wants to have a “contribution to solve the housing problem in Portugal” and “does not exclude being in any segment” of the market.
Build to rent project in the pipeline
In this sense, he revealed, Sierra has been “talking to various municipalities” in the country with a view to moving forward with ” build-to-rent ” projects, admitting that it is not only a developer, but also a rental manager.
At the same time, it also wants to invest in other residential investment segments, such asco-living, serviced apartments and senior residences.
In the service provision segment – whether in hotels, offices, residential, health, food markets, shopping centers, logistics and student and senior residences – Sierra now operates in 35 countries, having made its debut last year in a new geography: Kosovo.
Guedes de Oliveira also highlighted the expansion of Sierra’s investment management business, in which the company announced a joint venture with PGIM to invest in the hotel sector and currently operates 20 investment vehicles, appearing “in the top 150 of the largest real estate managers globally”.
At the same time, Sierra continues to focus on the shopping center business, having invested 83 million euros “in value-added interventions” in Europe and intending to “continue to grow” outside the European context, namely in South America (it has two projects in the pipeline in Brazil and a project in the licensing phase in Colombia, for mixed residential and commercial use) and in North Africa (where it has another shopping center under construction in Zenata, near Casablanca).
