Advising EQT Real Estate on £1 billion joint venture for London

We have advised global investor EQT on a £1 billion residential real estate joint venture, set to bring 3000 new rental homes to Greater London.

The billion-sterling investment portfolio of high-quality build-to-rent residential homes is being launched with residential property developer Sigma Capital. It is the first UK investment for EQT Real Estate, a division of global investor EQT Partners.

The new homes will be backed by £50 million of investment from Homes England, the UK government's housing accelerator programme.

Peter Shacalis, EQT Director, said: "This is an exciting and important venture for us, both as our entrance to the UK market and as a compelling investment opportunity with significant social impact. Taylor Wessing has supported us every step of the way with their invaluable practical and commercial insight, and we are delighted to have had them as our advisors."

Head of Real Estate, Keith Barnett, said: "Our real estate team has been the advisors behind many of the UK's landmark property projects and the world's most iconic buildings. This exciting new venture for EQT, their first into the UK, is the latest example of this. We look forward to watching EQT's shared strategy for the UK, alongside Sigma, develop in the coming years."

Our team was led by Keith Barnett with support from: Ed Story (partner) and Tom Benjamin (associate) in our corporate group; Shilpa Vaswani (senior associate) in our real estate group; David Quinlan (partner) and Ralph Wood (associate) from our construction group; Graham Samuel-Gibbon (partner) from our tax group.