Aberdeen Property Investors has been active in contacts with German investors and has now established an independent office in Cologne, Germany.
âAs one of Europeâs largest markets, both in terms of property and of investment capital interested for international cross-border investments, Germany is a key market. I see this as an important step in our ambition to become the leading property asset management company in Europeâ comments Rickard Backlund, CEO of Aberdeen Property Investors.
Aberdeen recently recruited Bernd Essler as Managing Director for Germany. Mr Essler was earlier Managing Director at Sal. Oppenheim Bank, heading their in-house real estate business.
âIn his role, Bernd will be our link to the German market and institutions. He will initially focus on attracting investment money through initiating German and Luxembourg based real estate funds as part of Aberdeenâs European expansion strategyâ, continues Mr Backlund.
After three months with Aberdeen, Bernd Essler establishes Aberdeenâs first German office together with two employees. By 1st of April, two more fund managers will join the team.
âInitially we focus on building relations with German private and institutional investors for crossborder investments, but long term we also believe in the German property market as an investment area after the consolidation of the marketâ, says Bernd Essler, Managing Director in Germany.
The German team will also manage the Luxembourg based open-ended funds for institutional investors.
âThis will provide a better base for the expansion of our international property funds. We foresee property funds as a very important part of institutions international property exposure and we are dedicating ourselves to assist in developing international funds suitable to our clients says Ubbe Strihagen, Marketing Director.
Source: Aberdeen Property Investors
