Cara Buys Central London Building for $93M

7-10 Waterloo Place. Image courtesy of Barings

Cara Real Estate—the real estate subsidiary of Cara Investment GmbH—has purchased 7-10 Waterloo Place, a 35,000-square-foot mixed-use building in London, from Barings for a reported £71 million, or $92.5 million. Barings had paid £35 million, or $45.6 million, in 2014 for the Grade II-listed property on behalf of an institutional investor, which subsequently started a substantial renovations program.

The deal marks Cara’s second London acquisition. In 2018, the Frankfurt-based investor acquired 20 Soho Square, W1, for £117 million, or $152.5 million.

A spokesperson for Barings—a subsidiary of MassMutual Financial Group—was unable to provide additional information requested by Commercial Property Executive as of press time.

A hazy market

Absorption in the Central London office market in the fourth quarter was almost 3 million square feet, or consistent with the market’s five-year average, according to a fourth-quarter report from Cushman & Wakefield. Investment volume, however, was about 30 percent below the five-year average. The report also notes that, although both leasing and preleasing remain strong, the Central London office supply has inched up to 13.6 million square feet.

Exactly a year ago, Cara Investment bought an approximately 75,000-square-foot mixed-use property at Zero Bond St. in Manhattan from Paramount Group for $130.5 million. The fully leased retail-and-office asset is adjacent to the NYU campus.

As for Barings, just last month, in a partnership with B&Z Development, the firm broke ground on an almost 120,000-square-foot speculative Class A office building at 701 Rio in downtown Austin, Texas.