Singapore’s Elite Partners Enters Netherlands Market With Warehouse Buy

Elite Partners Capital on Tuesday announced its acquisition of a warehouse in the central Netherlands, marking the Singapore-based fund manager’s entry into the Dutch logistics market.

The asset in the city of Nunspeet provides a gross floor area of 30,817 square metres (331,711 square feet) and is fully leased to B&C International, a supplier of custom window treatments, Elite Partners said in a release.

Elite Partners is buying the warehouse for an undisclosed amount less than a month after it revealed its purchase of a distribution facility in Wales, as the firm continues to amass a portfolio of industrial and commercial assets across Europe.

“The Netherlands is one of the top logistics markets in Europe, underpinned by efficient ports and well-established logistics infrastructure,” said Elite Partners CEO Victor Song. “We are excited to announce our first acquisition within the Dutch market and look forward to growing our footprint here due to its strong fundamentals and logistics demand.”

Going Dutch

The purchase of the Nunspeet asset, from a seller identified only as a private investor, was made on behalf of Elite Logistics Fund II, the second in Elite Partners’ pan-European fund series targeting prime logistics assets in high-growth and defensive sectors.

The warehouse sits on 55,108 square metres of land within the Feithenhof business park, which serves as a conduit between the urban core Randstad area and the northeastern Netherlands and northern Germany. The shed is used largely for sorting and distribution and also contains the headquarters of B&C, a residential brand of US-based Springs Window Fashions.

In a year of record-breaking leasing activity, the Netherlands saw logistics take-up reach 6.9 million square metres in 2021, trailing only Germany (8.6 million) and Poland (7.3 million), according to data compiled by Savills.

Dutch logistics stock increased by 10 percent last year, but the Netherlands remained one of the most undersupplied markets with a low vacancy rate of 3.3 percent, the property consultancy said in its European Logistics Outlook released in February.

European Tour

Before its acquisition of the Welsh facility for more than £30 million ($36 million) via Elite Logistics Fund II, Elite Partners had previously acquired four UK commercial properties, including an eight-storey office building in Scotland’s largest city of Glasgow in September 2020 for £70 million through its UK Commercial Fund III, which aims for assets under management of up to £200 million.

In August 2020, the Singaporean firm announced its acquisition of a PepsiCo warehouse near Warsaw for more than €30 million (now $30.7 million) from P3 Logistics Park, a wholly owned subsidiary of Singapore sovereign wealth fund GIC.

The Poland deal was made via the Macquarie-backed Elite Logistics Fund I, which invested in as many as 18 properties across Poland, Germany, Spain, Czechia and Britain before selling a dozen assets to Blackstone for €520 million ($586 million) in late 2021.

Elite Partners was founded in 2017 by shareholders including Song, who had worked on the investment team at ESR-REIT’s forerunner, Cambridge Industrial Trust, and later served as head of asset management at Viva Industrial Trust, which merged with ESR-REIT in 2018. This year, ESR-REIT merged with ARA Logos Logistics Trust to form ESR-Logos REIT.