German Residential Property – An Update

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Adler Real Estate, BIW, Conwert Immobilien Invest, Deutsche Annington Immobilien, Deutsche Wohnen, Estavis, Gagfah, German property, Grand City Properties, GSW Immobilien, KWG Kommunale Wohnen, LEG Immobilien, NAV discount, Patrizia Immobilien, REIT, residential property, Stavros Efremidis, TAG Immobilien, Taliesin Property Fund, Youniq

It’s a year now since I completed my German residential property series (Parts I, II, III, IV & V, and the first part of this post offers a brief recap) so it’s a good time to take another look. With winter drawing in fast, why not whip up a plate of sauerbraten & pour a (very) large stein of beer, and we’ll begin:

I’m ignoring companies with non-English IR websites. This may be a personal prejudice, but sometimes it can be hard enough to decipher a company’s communications & (underlying) performance without suffering a language barrier too! For practical reasons, I’m also ignoring sub-10 million market caps, plus companies with a relatively minor German property allocation. [But here’s a fairly comprehensive list of these companies]. I’m kicking out Youniq (YOU:GR) (see comments below), plus Speymill (SYG:LN) which has disposed of its German property to Jim Mellon. However, I’ve added two big IPOs from earlier this year (Deutsche Annington & LEG), plus Adler who ramped up its residential portfolio this year (& added an English IR website). Finally, I’ll still treat Deutsche Wohnen & GSW as separate companies, even though the takeover of GSW’s now a done deal. [GSW may well remain a separately listed company]. This leaves us with 13 companies, a baker’s dozen – the vast majority of which are residential pure plays. They should serve as a good proxy for the entire sector:

Adler Real Estate (ADL:GR)

Conwert Immobilien Invest (CWI:AV)

Deutsche Annington Immobilien (ANN:GR)

Deutsche Wohnen (DWNI:GR)

Estavis (E7S:GR)

Gagfah (GFJ:GR)

Grand City Properties (GYC:GR)

GSW Immobilien (GIB:GR)

KWG Kommunale Wohnen (BIW:GR)

LEG Immobilien (LEG:GR)

Patrizia Immobilien (P1Z:GR)

TAG Immobilien (TEG:GR)

Taliesin Property Fund (TPF:LN)

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KWG Kommunale Wohnen AG

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BIW, Conwert Immobilien Invest, CWI, European sovereign debt crisis, German bunds, Germany, Grand City Properties, Hans-Peter Haselsteiner, home ownership, income/dividend bubble, Karl Ehlerding, KWG Kommunale Wohnen, Net LTV, residential property, Sirius Real Estate, Stavros Efremidis, Torsten Hoffmann

It’s six months now since I did a write-up on KWG Kommunale Wohnen AG (BIW:GR) (the ultimate post in a 5-part series). Actually, a recap’s in order here & probably the best introduction for this post:

Part I & II:   German residential property has been (recently) described as:

‘Perhaps one of the safest & most attractive asset classes in Europe, or even the world‘.

Its attractions include:

– Demographics:   German population growth is broadly neutral, but is experiencing pronounced trends in favour of urban migration, smaller households & increasing floor size per capita. Investor horizons are often limited when it comes to property – they’d do well to note Germany has the largest population in Europe, the 16th largest in the world & Berlin is the EU’s 2nd largest city with 3.5 million inhabitants!

– Supply & Demand:   Annual housing demand’s around 250-350 K pa, well ahead of housing completions which are now accelerating but only recently bottomed out at 175 K pa in 2009-10. Germany’s second-hand property also trades at a major discount – e.g. in Berlin, existing housing stock can be purchased at a 30%+ discount to new building costs.

– Home Ownership:   German home ownership is a lowly 46%, in stark contrast to the usual Western market rate of 60-65%+. This reflects the government’s long history of housing provision & rent subsidies/suppression, but in recent years authorities have increasingly opted for privatisation. Couple this with rising prices & rents, plus the desire for a safer long-term investment alternative (vs. equity/bond markets) – I think we can be confident of a slow & steady convergence towards Western home-ownership levels.

Xmas Trimmings, etc.

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ASFI, Asta Funding, BIW, CLNY, Colony Financial, Conwert, correlation, CWI, distressed assets, FIG, financial crisis, Fortress Investment Group, intrinsic value, Karl Ehlerding, KWG Kommunale Wohnen, Leverage, majority control, Merry Xmas, Price/Book, Stavros Efremidis, TRIB, Trinity Biotech

Asta Funding (ASFI:US) $9.37:   I’ve marginally trimmed my stake from 3.8% to 3.6% – consider this to be purely risk ‘house-keeping‘. This realizes a +22% gain vs. my write-up price on this small slice, and a +31% gain vs. my actual net entry price (which inc. the impact of dividends). I never got around to an Asta follow-up, as the share price (& NAV) just steadily chugged higher. Despite the rising share price, I’ve been bemused (even encouraged) by the general air of neglect still attached to this stock. Even ASFI shareholders have expressed a distinct lack of enthusiasm for the company’s progress in the past year! This is particularly in reaction to the company’s diversification into personal injury & divorce financing. Which puzzles me…

I’d counter this distaste in a number of ways: i) This new direction was prompted by Asta’s reluctance to pay up to acquire new distressed consumer receivable portfolios*. Personally, I’m delighted – how often do you see management take an absolute, rather than a relative, approach to value? [Picking up distressed debt at 9 cts on the dollar, while everybody else pays 10 cts, doesn’t mean you’ve bagged an actual bargain!] And to resist pissing away idle cash burning a hole in their pockets is quite admirable too. Of course, returning capital (via share buybacks) is a great alternative – Asta’s pursued this to a limited degree during the year. However, considering current metrics, I consider the short term return/attraction of a buyback is fairly even balanced against the potentially higher returns on offer from a (gradual) investment of their cash into distressed assets.

German Residential Property V – A Buy!

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Barmer Wohnungsbau, catalyst, commercial property, convergence, correlation, Deutsche Wohnen, EPRA NAV, German bunds, German property, Germany, Karl Ehlerding, KWG Kommunale Wohnen, large cap stocks, marathon, NAV, NAV discount, NAV premium, Net LTV, North Rhine-Westphalia, Price/Book, REIT/MLP sector, rental yield, residential property, Sirius Real Estate, small cap stocks, Stavros Efremidis, Taliesin, value investing

Continued from here. A 5-part series might seem like overkill – hmm, I’ve done worse 😉 – hopefully, you found something useful in each post. And, of course, I wanted to illustrate the research (& contemplation) required for any real investment edge in your stock-picking & portfolio. Peer/sector analysis may perhaps be the most rewarding component – though it drives me to distraction occasionally…

Picture it: You come across a random gem – you suspect it’s best of breed & should be pounced upon asap! Instead you take a breath, step back & force yourself to research it (and its peers) from all conceivable angles. Meanwhile, your gem’s share price begins to ascend rapidly, and you’re totally missing out… I’m suffering that with one idea I want to exploit – the apparent gem of the sector’s jumped 20%+, gahhh!

But investing isn’t a sprint, it’s an (often painful) marathon. We all remember a satisfying quick-fire buy that worked out, but we’re really just trying to forget the pain of misguided duds… Disasters we might perhaps have avoided if we’d researched them a little more, or picked the better horse. Research & patience are ultimately far more profitable than grabbing the first nice stock you see. Also, peer/sector analysis is essential to my preferred approach to investment:

Great Story, Great Stock & Great Price