000 units in the railway company Deutsche Bahn

Will the real estate boom awaited in Germany finally crab-wise on the horizon Investors appear to be more convinced every day. American Investment Fund Fortress should be traded in the month of October its German real estate holding to lift between 1.3 and 1.5 billion euros. This project revealed yesterday by the "Financial Times Deutschland" and confirmed by a spokesman for the Group would be the biggest operation in the German financial market for two years. The set holding for sale, umbrella companies Gagfah, Nileg and Woba, owns and manages a residential housing stock of 160,000 units in the Federal Republic.

Fortress is not the only one investor to focus closely on the German real estate market. In 2000, the Japanese investment bank Nomura spent EUR 2.1 billion to buy 64.000 units in the railway company Deutsche Bahn. The Terra Firma British have, taken last year Viterra, the largest German residential real property owner with almost 150,000 apartments. The sale of this heritage, which was until then the energy group E.ON, concluded for a record sum of EUR 4 billion, plus $ 3 billion of debt recovery. Morgan Stanley also wished to enter this market by buying 48.000 apartments to the industrial group ThyssenKrupp.

Golden opportunity

The sudden arrival of these major investors is not innocent. A large part of the German real estate heritage is controlled by large companies, local communities and regional governments. Wishing to focus on their core business, these owners are happy to sell to the highest bidder portfolios very important housing. A golden opportunity for investors who believe in the growth potential of this sector. "We believe that the Germany is one of the most interesting markets in the world, notes John Carrafiell, Director of Morgan Stanley Real Estate in Europe." With nearly 260 billion euros of funds already spent, institutional and private investors have more invested in real estate here than in any other country.

The Germany remains, it is true, a country where housing are still much cheaper than in the rest of the continent. An apartment in the centre of Riga, Latvia, thus more expensive than a comparable to Hamburg home... A two-piece in Berlin is to "bargain" 50 to 60 cheaper than in London. And the trend for the moment showed no sign of reversal. In 2005, the German real estate market was the only one to have recorded a decrease of prices throughout the European Union.

This situation does not encourage the Germans to become owners. 56 of households are still tenants, against only 30 in Britain. The pathological care of local banks, which offer a very limited range of credits and often refuse to lend more than 10 of the sale of a property price, also hinders the eagerness of potential investors. The bleak economic climate affecting the Federal Republic for more than a decade encourages nor families to acquire a home. The first light signs of recovery but start to appear. Encouraging news for the funds that have spent billions of euros in the purchase of housing.