Unibail to Sell French Shopping Mall For $390 Million

PARIS, France — Unibail-Rodamco SE agreed to sell a French shopping center to Allianz SE and Hammerson Plc, the third mall divestment that the French property company has announced in four months.

Allianz will buy 90 percent of the Nicetoile mall in the city of Nice, while Hammerson Plc will acquire the rest and manage the property, Paris-based Unibail said in a statement yesterday. The transaction is valued at 312.5 million euros ($390 million), according to the statement.

“With the announcement of this transaction, Unibail-Rodamco largely completes the streamlining of its French shopping center portfolio announced earlier this year,” Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Christophe Cuvillier said in the statement.

Unibail-Rodamco, Europe’s biggest property company, in February announced a plan to sell between 1.5 billion euros and 2 billion euros of shopping malls over five years in order to focus on its largest assets. Since then, the company has agreed to sell more than 2 billion euros of properties including the deal announced today.

The Nicetoile shopping center has 15,389 square meters (166,000 square feet) of retail space and 2,018 square meters of offices, Unibail-Rodamco said. The mall attracts 13 million visitors a year and tenants include Sephora and Swarovski.

The acquisition cost of 312.5 million euros results in a net initial yield of 5 percent, Unibail-Rodamco said.

In October, Unibail-Rodamco agreed to sell six shopping centers in France valued at 850 million euros to Wereldhave NV. In July, the company announced the sale of six malls valued at 931 million euros to Carmila.

By Dalia Fahmy; editors: Andrew Blackman, Ross Larsen.