No-hassle package for Brits buying in Berlin
LONDON (Reuters) - Private British investors eyeing Germany's lagging and relatively cheap property market are being offered a package to invest in Berlin's residential sector with minimum fuss and guaranteed yields.
UK-based Berlin Capital Investments says it hopes to attract investors to its scheme to buy property in the "Dutch Quarter" of the German capital by offering a 10-year package designed to offer minimum rental yields of 4.4 percent plus 80 percent of future rent rises.
The package, based on a rental pool, includes all property management and maintenance fees and requires no hands-on relationship with tenants or even the management agent, Berlin Capital says.
Institutional non-German investors and adventurous UK and Irish private investors have been snapping up German real estate on expectations that a growing recovery in Europe's largest economy will feed through to its property market, which has largely missed out on a protracted real estate boom in the rest of Europe.
German commercial property transactions reached a record high of 50 billion euros (34 billion pounds) last year, largely driven by foreign buyers, according to property services group Jones Lang LaSalle.
Berlin Capital said prices ranged from 56,000 euros to 131,000 euros in the Dutch Quarter, which is within easy reach of the Alexanderplatz.
"Germany is currently one of the hottest property markets," said the company's director, Fergal Creed.
"Extremely low capital prices make it very accessible to investors. This is combined with the re-emerging strength of Europe's largest economy, which delivers economic confidence to the investor."
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