Property guru to launch fund
Property veteran and former Slough Estates chief executive Roger Carey is set to launch a new property fund to take advantage of bargain opportunities in the depressed real estate market.
The UK Strategic Income Property Fund will be managed by Graham Gould from Cobra Asset Management and BDOStoy Hayward Investment Management, and will take advice from property consultants Strutt & Parker.
But sources said investors would be paying a hefty sum for the involvement of industry heavyweights like Carey and Gould.
Investors will be charged a fee of up to six per cent to enter the fund and must make a minimum investment of £100,000.
The six per cent fee is made up of: an entry fee of two per cent; an annual management fee of one per cent of the gross asset value of the fund; and an adviser fee of up to three per cent.
Management will also take 20 per cent of anything earned over a 10 per cent total return target. Most funds would not charge the steep three per cent adviser fee.
“It seems as though the fund is doubling-up on management fees and outsourcing advisers,” one industry source said.
BDO’s investment property director Robert Walter said: “If you were to compare this to a larger institutional fund it would seem expensive, but this is a specialised vehicle and I believe it to be similar to what other funds of this type charge.This is a high quality team.”
The group is hoping to lure investors over the next couple of months and expects to close its doors in the first quarter of next year with at least £100m.
ROGER CAREY
FORMER SLOUGH ESTATES CHIEF EXECUTIVE
Roger Carey, 64, has more than 40 years of experience in the property sector, making him one of the industry’s highest profile characters.
A former chartered surveyor, Carey spent 14 years at MEPC and is a past president of industry body the British Property Federation.
Carey joined Slough Estates (now rebranded as Segro) as a director from 1983 to 1996. In 1997, he became chief executive of Saville Cordon Estates, leading a management buy-out in 2002. The company, renamed Industrious, was subsequently sold to Brixton in 2005 for £460m then on to Dunedin in 2006 for £600m.
In his spare time, Carey enjoys playing tennis and golf, and counts his collection of vintage Aston Martin cars as his prized possessions.
Carey’s friendship with Graham Gould, who founded Residential Property Investment Management in 1999 and COBA Asset Management in 2003, has led him towards this latest venture of a UK strategic home income property fund.