Oaktree signs in Quabit and Savills to the steering committee of its promoter SDIN

Contract

Transfers of bluebells in the real estate market. Oaktree has joined the ranks of SDIN, the developer that bought Banco Sabadell last summer, two names of the sector: Rubén Bernat, until now Quabit’s CFO, and Pablo Méndez, director of residential, alternative and ‘capital markets ‘in Savills.

These two executives join as the first swords of Francisco Pérez, general director of ISDIN, together with whom they have the challenge of addressing Oaktree’s growth plans for the promoter and that, according to knowledgeable sources, have become even more ambitious in the years. In recent times, precisely because of the opportunities to buy land that the US fund believes will arise with the Covid-19 crisis.

Bernat has assumed the position of corporate director, with responsibility for the areas of Finance, Technology and Legal Advice, while Méndez is the Director of Investments (CIO) and has the challenge of maintaining a bag of land with the capacity to produce 10,000 homes. Both have become part of the management committee of the real estate company, which is finishing forming the company leadership to address the new era that opens under the command of the US fund.

In parallel, the developer is also finishing designing the new strategic plan, to adapt it to the reality that the pandemic has brought, although its initial objective is to deliver 2,000 homes per year, according to knowledgeable sources, always maintaining a bag of land that guarantees this production capacity for a period of five years.

At the end of last year, SDIN had the management and administration of 328 developments and land to build more than 15,000 homes. Within the asset rotation policy of these companies, their plans include selling a part of this land, not considering it strategic, and acquiring others that do meet the requirements of the new shareholder.

Although a year of the agreement between Banco Sabadell and Oaktree was completed in August, which will lead the fund to control 80% of the developer, while the entity will continue with 20%, the operation is still pending final closure, a milestone scheduled for mid-September, when the bureaucratic and administrative tasks typical of this type of operation are finished.

The transaction has been delayed because it needed the approval of the Ministry of Economy, which it received at the end of last July. However, operationally, the fund is working together with the promoter’s team on future plans and, in fact, these two signings are already under its seal, according to the same sources.

As El Confidencial announced last spring, the fund also launched a process to sign a first sword that, on behalf of Victoria Asset Management (Oaktree company), will occupy the presidential seat of the new promoter subsidiary, without executive power, but with an important institutional weight. The chosen one was César González-Bueno , former CEO of ING and current chairman of its advisory board, whose main challenge will be to organize the entire company to go public in the medium term.

The sale of Sabadell to Oaktree was closed last year at 882 million euros for land valued at 1,300 million euros, which is concentrated in Barcelona and its metropolitan area, Madrid and its metropolitan area, the axis that connects Valencia and Alicante and some cities and specific areas of Andalusia such as Málaga, Cádiz or Alumuñecar (Granada), locations that continue to be the promoter’s main object of desire.