Q&A with BC Partners Real Estate head: "Europe is one of the few safe places to invest"

When BC Partners, the mid-market UK private equity firm, decided to enter the European real estate market seven years ago, it hired Paris-based Stéphane Theuriau as its first head of BC Partners Real Estate.

Theuriau had already served in a high-profile private equity real estate capacity at Morgan Stanley, where he was head of French real estate investing and later European head. He then entered the listed real estate sector as CEO of Altarea Cogedim, where he led a company that trebled its market cap to €3bn.

It was a very different time in 2018 when BC Partners set about raising its first real estate fund, with a low interest rate propelled by QE and persistent cap rate compression for various asset classes. The firm exceeded its target of €500m-€750m to ultimately close on€900m of equity firepower, including sidecar vehicles for the value-add pan European real estate strategy.

At the end of 2019, the firm held a first close on its debut fund, but then came the pandemic, lockdowns and a slow return to the office. Nevertheless, the company slowly deployed capital and by 2022, when it held a final close, some 40% of the €900m raised had been deployed.

Theuriau sat down with Green Street News to discuss how he sees the market in 2025 and what success would look like to him by the end of the year.

Read the full interview (behind paywall):here