Spain has been leading the recovery of Southern Europe’s commercial real estate market since the Great Financial Crisis (GFC), due to continued interest from foreign investors who have been responsible for 62 percent of all commercial real estate investment activity so far this year. Investment volumes are looking to hit €8.9 billion ($10 billion) this year, a year-over-year increase of 5 percent, and a post GFC record.

Residential development in Spain is back, with banks again willing to provide finance and reckless lending a thing of the past. 

Cranes on the skylines of Spanish cities, such a prevalent feature a decade ago, are returning. With housing demand picking up, Spanish developers are once more establishing pipelines and breaking ground at a quickening pace.

Bankinter has closed the sale of the largest package of toxic assets of the entire crisis: the so-called 'Champions League Project', with unpaid loans valued at €436 million, which was awarded to the Norwegian fund Axactor.

Inmobiliaria Colonial has secured €416 million to fund its takeover bid of Axiare Patrimonio Socimi. Colonial, which already owns nearly 29 percent of Axiare’s capital, launched the bid earlier in November to secure the remaining 71 percent. 

Colonial Group has raised €800m through a bond issue as it looks to acquire rival real estate invesmtent trust (REIT) Axiare Patrimonio. The Spanish REIT, or Socimi, issued senior unsecured notes of €500m with an eight-year maturity and €300m with a 12-year maturity.

Axiare Patrimonio acquires another property in line with its strategic business plan and brings the total value of its property portfolio close to EUR 1,750 million. The Socimi has acquired an office property at Calle Josefa Valcárcel, 40 bis in Madrid, which is currently under construction, for EUR 29.7 million. 

Barings Real Estate Advisers has acquired a logistics unit in Spain from Deka Immobilien for €17.6m. The real estate investment manager said the 29,000sqm class A warehouse, in Zaragoza, is fully let to Eroski, a national supermarket chain, until 2021.

Colonial Group has launched a takeover attempt of rival Spanish-listed property company Axiare Patrimonio. A takeoever would lift Colonial’s asset value to €10bn and consolidate its standing as a landlord of prime office assets in Paris, Madrid and Barcelona. 

Meridia Capital Partners has tapped its third fund to buy the Barnasud shopping centre in Barcelona in a €35m deal. The firm said it plans to carry out a €7m capital expenditure programme in the asset, which was built in 1995 by food retailer Caprabo and sold to Unibail in 2002.

HNA Group Co.’s precarious grip on a $2.2 billion Spanish hotel company is in doubt as a mountain of debt comes due and China puts the squeeze on its most prolific acquirers. The Chinese conglomerate, whose assets include a quarter of Hilton Worldwide Holdings Inc., owns about 30 percent of Madrid-based NH Hotel Group SA. But HNA is in Spanish limbo. 

Copenhagen and Madrid will join the ranks of Berlin, Frankfurt, and Munich as the top cities for real estate investment and development in 2018, according to Emerging Trends in Real Estate® Europe 2018. The annual forecast, published jointly by the Urban Land Institute (ULI) and PwC, is based on the opinions of over 800 real estate professionals in Europe, including investors, developers, lenders, agents, and consultants.

European logistics is a market real estate lenders cannot afford to ignore, but it has its challenges.

Liberbank, the eighth-largest bank in Spain by market value, has sold a €602 million non-performing property loan portfolio to Bain Capital and Oceanwood.

The landscape for European real estate debt funds has changed over the past five years as investors have sought to diversify. The top five private Europe-focused funds raised this year reflect what has become a substantially larger industry and suggest a broader range of target deals for debt funds.

Liberbank has agreed to sell its real estate portfolio to a fund managed by Bain Capital for €750 million ($885 million).

TH Real Estate has acquired the hypermarket premises at L'Aljub Shopping Centre in Elche on behalf of the Southern European Value-Add (SEVA) investment vehicle, from Eroski for €18.7m.

Spain tops the 2017 edition of the Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Report 2017, The World Economic Forum global rankings for the second time. France followed in second and Germany (third), Japan (fourth, gaining five places), the United Kingdom (fifth), the United States (sixth, losing two places), Australia (seventh), Italy (eighth), Canada (ninth, up one) and Switzerland (10th, losing four places).

US asset management giants Blackstone and Brookfield have reportedly made offers to buy Spanish Banco Sabadell's hotel arm, HI Partners.

On Sunday 1 October, Catalonia held a controversial referendum for independence. The vote was deemed unconstitutional by the Spanish Constitutional Court and the central government tried to prevent it from taking place by ordering police and security force reinforcements to seize ballots and close polling locations.

Tristan Capital Partners’ European Property Investors Special Opportunities fund has sold a portfolio of seven Spanish retail properties to private equity firm MDSR Investments for €149m.