The warehouse, fully let to Maersk, is the joint venture’s fourth acquisition in the country this year and its ninth since 2023. Purchased from DLH Real Estate, it follows acquisitions in Frankfurt, Stuttgart and Hannover that have added over 100,000 sqm to the portfolio this year.
The JV’s pan-European portfolio now includes over 50 assets spanning 1.6 million sqm across the UK, Spain Italy, France and the Netherlands, in addition to Germany.
Construction of the state-of-the-art warehouse in Bremerhaven – Northern Europe’s fourth largest seaport and Europe's seventh largest – completed in 2024. The DGNB Gold asset has best-in-class ESG credentials and is fully let on a long-term lease to the global shipping and logistics giant.
In August, the JV acquired a 28,000 sqm urban warehouse in Germany’s second strongest economic region, Stuttgart. The high-quality asset is located in Böblingen, a dense mixed-use commercial zone approximately 30 minutes from Stuttgart city centre and 10 minutes from Sindelfingen. Sindelfingen is a global auto manufacturing hub which has been home to Mercedes-Benz's largest manufacturing plant for over 100 years. The warehouse was recently substantially refurbished to an institutional standard; its ESG profile will be further enhanced through a targeted capex and asset management programme.
In July, the JV acquired two prime multi-let warehouses from Aberdeen totalling 44,000 sqm of space. The warehouses are located in Florsheim and Erlensee, two of Frankfurt’s strongest infill logistics markets, and were built in 2015 and 2018, respectively. They are both less than 30 minutes from the city’s central business district and have immediate access to key transport corridors in West Germany, ensuring strong regional and national connectivity. The Florsheim asset is certified DGNB Gold; the Erlensee asset will be brought to BREEAM Excellent standard as part of the asset management programme.
The purchases have added to the JV’s existing footprint in Frankfurt, where it now manages 120,000 sqm across four assets. It purchased a fully let 33,000 sqm warehouse in the west of the city in late 2024, located at the intersection of the A60/A61 highways, enabling distribution to the Frankfurt metropolitan area, southern Germany and the populous Ruhr region.
In Q2 of this year, the JV also acquired a 34,000 sqm refurbished warehouse in Lehrte, an established logistics cluster of Hannover, from Swiss Life. The asset has direct access to the A2 motorway connecting the Ruhr to Berlin and Poland and also benefits from proximity to major domestic occupiers including Continental, Volkswagen, and Rossmann. The JV intends to conduct a light refurbishment programme to achieve BREEAM Very Good certification.
James Farmer, Partner at Boreal IM, commented: “The opportunity in Germany is underscored by solid fundamentals including attractive supply-demand dynamics in the right locations. We are harnessing our experience across cycles in the German market to acquire high-quality, prime-located and institutional-grade assets with potential to unlock alpha through targeted ESG-focused asset management strategies.
“The business has a huge amount of collective experience in Germany, giving us preferential origination channels and granular visibility on the local market dynamics, which we combine with our in-house technical and asset management capabilities to create value for our investors.”
Boreal is a specialist investor in the European logistics sector, where it targets standing assets as well as development and forward-funding opportunities in the region’s core economies. The company was founded in 2022 by its partners Louis-Simon Ferland (CEO and founder), Peter Bingel, Nikos Koulouras, and James Farmer, who bring an average of 20 years of industry experience. On behalf of global institutional investors, the partners have invested over €13bn across 150 transactions and 510 assets in 20 European countries.
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