The real estate fund is likely to be in place by March 2009.
Walton Street Capital India, the Indian arm of the US-based private equity (PE) real estate investment company, Walton Street Capital, is in the process of raising a country-specific, realty-focused India fund. The fund, whose corpus is expected to be close to $1 billion, is likely to close by March next year, with the first closure expected within the next couple of months.
The global PE fund is raising an India-specific, real estate fund for the first time. Walton Street, which had earlier raised a $2.5-billion global fund, had invested a significant part of it in India. Walton Street has investing in the US, Mexico, the EU and India. It has real estate assets worth $14 billion across the globe.
The PE major is rethinking its investment strategy. “The slowdown you see today or the crash in the real estate prices you hear of so often today is happening only at the micro level,” said Amber Malhotra, executive director, Walton Street Capital India.
Walton Street entered India about a year-and-a-half ago with investments in Shriram Properties. It will now look at investing in the affordable housing segment. The Indian real estate market is still positive, believes Walton Street.
“Most of the negativity you see is mostly sentimental. There is a lot of opportunity now for private equity,” Malhotra added. Till now, Walton has done a lot of physical underwriting and has invested in SEZs. It also has a stake in a township project of Shriram Properties in Kolkata.
Walton Street Capital was founded in 1994. It has received total equity commitment of $3.5 billion from public and corporate pension plans, foreign institutions, insurance companies and banks, endowments and foundations, trusts and high networth individuals. Walton Street has invested and/or has committed to invest approximately $3 billion of equity in approximately 150 separate transactions.
