DIC Asset AG: Avoiding high-street retail vacancy in Leverkusen – DIC secures direct follow-on lease for former Kaufhof department store, preserving retail amenity for the long term

Press Release 

DIC Asset AG: Avoiding high-street retail vacancy in Leverkusen – DIC secures direct follow-on lease for former Kaufhof department store, preserving retail amenity for the long term

• New lease for about 20,400 sqm signed for ten-year term
• New anchor tenant is the aachener clothing store
• Sustainable value-added for all stakeholders through long-term lease
   

Frankfurt am Main, 29 March 2023. DIC Asset AG (“DIC”), ISIN: DE000A1X3XX4, one of Germany’s leading listed property companies, is letting around 20,400 sqm of the high-street retail area at the vacated former Kaufhof department store in Leverkusen to Textilhandel GmbH Modehaus aachener, an apparel company based in Dortmund, in a seamless transition. By negotiating this direct follow-on lease with a ten-year term, DIC successfully preserved the continued operation of this retail location in Leverkusen and with it the appeal of its inner city while also saving many jobs. The property will remain fully tenant-occupied, and sustainably strengthens DIC’s rental cash flow in the Commercia Portfolio.

The retail property used to be fully occupied by GALERIA Karstadt Kaufhof GmbH. In conjunction with the department store chain’s insolvency proceedings, GALERIA Karstadt Kaufhof GmbH gave notice to terminate the lease as of 30 June 2023. The new lease partner, the Dortmund-based apparel retailer TEH Textilhandel GmbH Modehaus aachener, is in the process of setting up its own nationwide chain of department stores. Following brief restructuring works, it plans to move into its new location in the pedestrian precinct of Leverkusen in September 2023.

“What sets us apart is the firm resolve to shape things and to set our own course of action. We already demonstrated our ability to do so at the former Kaufhof site in Bremen, which we repositioned and successfully re-let, and we just demonstrated it again in Leverkusen. With this follow-on letting, we are connecting to the successful operational performance in 2022, once again generating value-added for our stakeholders in a creative and reliable approach,” commented Sonja Wärntges, the CEO of DIC.

“In DIC, we have an imaginative and reliable partner by our side who supports us in our expansion effort by providing suitable retail units in prime high-street locations. We are looking forward to the grand opening in September 2023 and to a long-term collaboration with DIC and the former Galeria staff,” said Friedrich Göbel, Managing Director of TEH Textilhandel GmbH Modehaus Aachener.

“For the city of Leverkusen, the lease deal is reassuring in more than one sense. Together with DIC and the aachener clothing store, we are preventing vacancies in Leverkusen’s inner city, helping to ensure that it remains permanently vibrant and attractive for the local population, and saving several jobs,” said Uwe Richrath, Chief Mayor of the City of Leverkusen.

The department store is in Leverkusen’s main pedestrian precinct and provides convenient public transport links as well as parking in the immediate vicinity. DIC acquired the three-storey building at Wiesdorfer Platz 82 with its retail area of about 13,000 sqm and about 7,400 sqm of office and storage space for its commercial portfolio in 2007.

About DIC Asset AG: 

DIC Asset AG is Germany’s leading listed specialist for office and logistics real estate with 25 years of experience on the real estate market and access to a broad-based network of investors. Our business is based on a regional and inter-regional real estate platform with nine offices on the ground in all major German markets (with VIB Vermögen AG included). We currently manage a total of 360 assets with a combined market value of EUR 14.7 billion on site, always close to our properties and their occupiers.

The Commercial Portfolio segment comprises real estate held for our own account. Here, we generate steady cash flows from stable rent revenues on long-term leases while also optimising the value of our portfolio assets through active management, and realising gains from sales.

In the Institutional Business segment, we earn recurrent fees from real estate services we provide to national and international institutional investors by structuring and managing investment products that return attractive dividend yields. 

DIC Asset AG has been SDAX-listed since June 2006.

For more details, go to www.dic-asset.de.

IR/PR Contact DIC Asset AG:
Peer Schlinkmann
Head of Investor Relations & Corporate Communications
Neue Mainzer Str. 20 • MainTor Primus

D-60311 Frankfurt am Main
T +49 69 9454858-1492
ir@dic-asset.de