Mapletree acquires £1bn PBSA platform

Mapletree Investments has acquired a £1bn purpose-built student accommodation platform comprising 8,192 beds across 19 cities in the UK and Germany from Cuscaden Peak Investments. The platform consists of 31 assets managed under the Student Castle and Capitol Students brands. The acquisition brings the overall bed count within Mapletree’s UK portfolio to more than 17,000 beds. The assets are strategically located in key university cities in the UK such as Bristol, Cambridge, Durham, Edinburgh, Oxford and York, as well as Bremen in Germany. Since entering the student housing market in 2016, Mapletree has grown its student housing portfolio to a total of 33,000 beds across 47 cities in the UK, the US, Germany and Canada, with total assets under management of S$6.2bn (£36.5bn). Mapletree said it will continue to invest into the PBSA space while leveraging its development capabilities to undertake greenfield and brownfield development projects to grow its student housing portfolio. Hiew Yoon Khong, group chief executive of Mapletree, said: “The acquisition is part of Mapletree’s strategy to grow the student accommodation sector in the UK, the US, Europe and Australia, which remain underserved by quality student housing assets. “The student housing sector is one of the group’s core real estate focus areas due to its fundamental demand-supply imbalance and defensive characteristics. We will capitalise on the newly acquired operating platform to support our strategic vision of growing as well as enhancing our operational performance in the UK.”