David is a private equity real estate partner in the London office. He has a broad practice advising investors on UK and European PERE deals across the risk spectrum for real estate funds, sovereign wealth funds, pension funds, family offices and operating partners. David advises on structuring and executing both distressed and non-distressed transactions including joint ventures, direct and indirect acquisitions/disposals and financings, restructurings, real estate M&A, minority and majority investments and co-investments, sale and leasebacks, development projects and development financings.
He has experience across all types of real estate assets and businesses including logistics and industrial assets, data centres, hospitality and hotels, health care/life sciences, film and sound studios, residential (PRS/BTR and build to sell), student accommodation, offices and retail.
David is recognised in The Legal 500 as a Leading Individual and by IFLR1000 as a Notable Practitioner.
Clients have described David and the team in The Legal 500 as “standouts,” “extremely responsive and thorough” with an ability to “cut straight to the heart of issues on transactions” and working with them feels “more like a part of the partnership than an external advisory law firm.” Clients also compliment their “commercial acumen and ability to find sensible compromises in negotiations as first rate.”
Experience
Recent experience includes advising:
- GIC in connection with its acquisition of a 40% interest in The Oxford Science Park from Magdalen College, Oxford and on a strategic joint venture between GIC and Magdalen College aimed at accelerating major development of the Science Park
- Sixth Street on its platform joint venture with Henley Investment Management, a UK-based private equity real estate firm, and on the joint venture’s first acquisition of a large office campus in West London close to Heathrow Airport
- Partners Group on its UK and European real estate acquisitions and investments including domestic and cross-border joint ventures and financings
- King Street and Arax Properties on their joint venture acquisition from Blackstone of Alban Gate in the City of London for £295 million and on the associated financing with Apollo
- Dutch pension fund APG on:
- its acquisition of a 75 per cent. interest in a joint venture with TH Real Estate, with a combined equity commitment of c.£800 million, to develop the St. James Centre in Edinburgh, one of the UK’s largest private regeneration projects
- a €400 million joint venture with Hines Ireland to develop four greenfield sites at Cherrywood, Dublin for PRS and associated retail and leisure purposes and on a wider €700 million PRS joint venture in the Dublin area
- QuadReal on UK and European indirect real estate investments
- A Family Office on the €500 million acquisition, development and financing of one of the World’s largest data centres and its associated letting to a major international tech company
- A U.S. Opportunity Fund with over $27 billion of assets under management on its UK and European real estate acquisitions and investments including domestic and cross-border joint ventures
- Bain Capital Real Estate in evaluating, negotiating and structuring real estate investments directly as well as through joint ventures, funds, co-investments and management arrangements with international and domestic sponsors, operators and managers
- A Sovereign Wealth Fund on its 50:50 joint venture with Brookfield in relation to the acquisition of Berlin’s Potsdamer Platz, reported to be Germany’s largest real estate transaction for eight years
- Saïd Holdings on its real estate investments and financings, including on the acquisition and subsequent sale of 5 Churchill Place, Canary Wharf, London, to a Chinese investor for £270 million and the acquisition of Aldermary House in the City of London for £48 million
- A South African Investor on a series of central London office acquisitions and financings totalling c.£250 million including the acquisition and financing of One Bartholomew Lane in the City of London
- A PERE Fund on its tenant credit sale and leaseback of four prominent London based private hospitals to a healthcare investor for £227 million
- A PERE Fund on the structured acquisition, financing and subsequent sale of 123 Buckingham Palace Road, London for c.£243 million
- A variety of Private Equity Funds including Bain Capital and TPG in connection with the real estate aspects of PE acquisitions and dispositions, including structuring and negotiation of occupancy leases, acquisition and disposition agreements and sale and leasebacks
Credentials
Publications
Awards
Memberships & Affiliations
Disclaimer
Ropes & Gray International LLP is a limited liability partnership registered in Delaware, United States of America and is a recognised body regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (with registered number 521000).