Savills Buying Investment Advisory Firm Eastdil Secured From Temasek for $1.1B

Savills has agreed to buy Eastdil Secured from a consortium led by Singapore’s state-owned Temasek in a deal valuing the Manhattan-based real estate investment bank and brokerage at $1.1 billion including debt.

The transaction is expected to significantly expand Savills’ capital markets advisory capabilities and strengthen its presence in North America, where Eastdil generates most of its revenue, the London-listed property consultancy said Thursday in a release. Temasek had partnered with fund manager Guggenheim Investments to acquire Eastdil from Wells Fargo in 2019 in a management-led buyout, with the US bank retaining a minority stake.

Eastdil specialises in large-scale commercial property sales, M&A, debt placement and structured credit advisory. Savills CEO Simon Shaw praised the US firm for its complementary geographical footprint and a culture similar to Savills’ own.

“This acquisition is a significant step forward for both of us, bringing to the global investment community a much-needed choice of leading advisory partner to deliver a comprehensive suite of investment banking, strategic, financial, development, leasing and other ‘boots on the ground’ property solutions,” Shaw said.

Leadership Transition

Under the deal terms, the acquisition will be funded through debt financing and an issuance of new shares representing 16 percent of the expanded Savills share capital. Eastdil’s 85 senior employees will collectively hold 6.3 percent of the enlarged Savills upon completion.

Led by outgoing CEO Roy March, Eastdil derived 76 percent of its $633 million in revenue last year from US business and has a small presence in Asia Pacific. Of note, the firm advised on the 2019 sale of Asian industrial giant GLP’s US logistics assets to Blackstone for $18.7 billion.

“This transaction marks the beginning of a new chapter for Eastdil Secured, which will accelerate our growth, create opportunities for our team, and significantly enhance our ability to provide best-in-class real estate investment banking services for our valued clients globally,” said March, who has been appointed executive chairman responsible for client advisory, execution and long-term strategy.

Longtime president Michael Van Konynenburg has taken over as Eastdil CEO, overseeing day-to-day operations, with senior managing director James McCaffrey shifting into the president role. Van Konynenburg and McCaffrey will join the Savills executive board.

The deal is scheduled to complete after satisfaction of customary regulatory and closing conditions, Savills said.

Profit Perks Up

Savills made its Eastdil splash on the same day that the London firm reported higher revenue and profit for 2025, as growth across its advisory and property management businesses offset weaker transaction markets earlier in the year.

Revenue rose 6.1 percent to £2.6 billion ($3.5 billion) as underlying profit before tax jumped 11.4 percent to £145.3 million and reported profit before tax climbed 14.4 percent to £101 million. 

Revenue increased across all business lines and regions, with transactional advisory income rising 4 percent and less-transactional divisions including property and facilities management, consultancy and investment management growing 8 percent.

“Whilst our transaction advisory business faced more challenging market conditions during Q2 and Q3 in some of our key markets, we continued to build strong transactional pipelines and were well positioned as clients’ confidence and appetite to transact accelerated into Q4, resulting in the strongest Q4 for our transactional business since 2019,” Shaw said.

Savills bolstered its APAC capital markets team in recent months by appointing former Knight Frank global capital markets head Neil Brookes as executive managing director with its Asia Pacific capital markets team, as well as JLL veteran Seb Turnbull as executive director of capital markets for Australia, responsible for the sale of office buildings across the country.