Ares Real Estate funds have acquired streaming giant Netflix’s London office headquarters from Union Investment.
The 41,571-square-foot Copyright Building at 25 Berners Street in Fitzrovia was being marketed by Knight Frank and Savills. Fineman Ross + Partners represented Ares. CoStar News tipped Ares as the front-runner for the asset in December. The guide price then was £160 million, reflecting a 4.39% yield or £1,493 per square foot. The final financial terms were not disclosed.
Signing has taken place, and the pair expect the acquisition will close in March 2025, ending a 10-year ownership period for the Germany investment company which held the building in its open-ended public real estate fund, UniImmo: Europa.
The eight-storey Fitzrovia office and retail building is almost fully let, with Capita Business Services holding a lease until 2037. It has been sublet to Netflix until 2032.
Rated BREEAM Excellent, the site has top sustainability credentials and is located near three underground stations.
This deal follows Union Investment’s sale of Finsbury Circus House to an Australian joint venture, and is the firm’s second exit in London in the past seven months.
“Institutional and private capital is increasingly looking to enter Central London. This is a good time to create more room for manoeuvre for our European real estate funds through strategic sales,” said Jacob Thompson, senior investment manager UK and Ireland at Union Investment.
“We acquired the Copyright Building immediately after its completion in 2017 with a long-term lease that has provided our private investors with strong and stable cash flow for almost a decade. Given the shortening remaining term of the leases, the timing of the sale is well chosen. We intend to reinvest the capital available from the recent sales and are actively seeking new attractive investment opportunities in London, specifically for our UniImmo: Deutschland fund,” said Adam Irányi, head of investment management global at Union Investment.
“We believe the acquisition of the Copyright Building is consistent with our thesis focused on high quality, well-located assets benefiting from the powerful rental growth we have seen in many of the Central London sub-markets,” said Wilson Lamont, partner and co-head of European real estate at Ares.
