The eagerly anticipated investment sale of a substantial part of Facebook’s International Headquarters, has been formally announced with a guide price in excess of €395m.
Cushman & Wakefield have been retained as sole agents to sell the 31,536 sq.m (339,456 sq.ft) Dublin based office investment. Forming an intrinsic part of the larger c. 83,612.7 sq.m (900,000 sq.ft) Facebook campus, the sale comprises four prime Grade A office blocks situated in the CBD area of Ballsbridge, an area regarded as Dublin’s most affluent and prestigious office location and forming part of city’s world renowned technological hub.
The four blocks are fully let to Facebook and offer a Weighted Average Unexpired Lease Term of over 15 years. The leases are held on full repairing and insuring terms and benefit from five yearly upward only open market rent reviews, the next of which is due in October 2022. The current passing rent is understood to break back to approximately €538.20 per sq.m (€50 per sq.ft), well below recent lettings in the area which have been achieving in excess of €645.83 per sq.m (€60 per sq.ft), suggesting strong reversionary potential for an incoming purchaser.
Facebook is understood to have committed significant capital sums in order to create a world class campus that will exclusively house their International headquarters and will eventually be home to over 7,000 employees. The subject properties have recently undergone an extensive refurbishment programme to bring them up to LEED Gold standard. Facebook pride themselves on designing, building and operating some of the most sustainable workplaces in the world with the Dublin campus expected to be WELL Platinum certified.
Founded in 2004, Facebook has grown to become one of the largest and most profitable companies in the world. In July of this year it became one of only six companies to breach the trillion-dollar market capitalisation level. It maintains a robust balance sheet, reporting total assets of over $170bn including cash and market securities of over $64bn as of the 30th June 2021.
Buoyed on by robust investor demand for Dublin office investments and the exceptionally strong investment fundamentals of the asset, Cushman & Wakefield are expecting strong interest from a global audience. With a net initial yield of over 4% and the real potential to increase this next year at rent review, the asset offers exceptionally good returns relative to some of its European peers and given the fact that Irish 10-year Government bonds are currently trading in negative territory.
