"Canada is among the top real estate markets in the world, and the Dundee REIT portfolio is made up of a large number of well-positioned assets in strong growth markets," says Katherine Lee, managing director of GE's Canadian operations. "We are looking forward to working with Dundee and growing this relationship." Dundee CEO Michael Cooper says in a release that the transaction provides "many benefits" for unit holders, further opining that it "demonstrates the intrinsic value of the Dundee portfolio, the Dundee executives and its employees."

Specific properties were not detailed, but Dundee's website puts the REIT's overall portfolio at 22 million sf, primarily office and industrial. In its home base of Ontario, Dundee has an office portfolio of 3.92 million sf. Besides a 50% stake in Dundee's headquarters building, the 413,000-sf State Street Financial Centre, other large assets in that sector are the 353,000-sf Aviva Corporate Center in Scarborough, the Woodbine Steeles Corporate Centre in Markham, and 55 St. Clair Ave. West, a 292,000-sf building in Toronto.

Dundee owns 41 office buildings in Quebec accounting for 1.82 million sf, 17 of which are located in Montreal. All but four in the Quebec block are under 100,000 sf, the smallest being 985 boulevard St.-Jean in Pointe-Claire, which has just 11,800 sf, while the largest is the 197,000-sf 400-480 boulevard Armand-Frappier in Laval. Dundee owns 3.3 million sf of industrial in Quebec, the largest being a 316,000-sf building in Baie d'Urfe, and has 27 industrial assets in Ontario totaling 2.5 million sf.

Based in Stamford, CT, GE Real Estate has been on an active program to make equity property investments globally, says SVP Alec Burger. While the company has been active in Canada, "this helps us accelerate our presence in the market," says Burger, who describes the Dundee assets as "a high quality portfolio in a number of dynamic and rapidly growing cities."

As part of the deal, GE Real Estate will buy $155 million of outstanding units of the Dundee REIT. The firms are anticipating that the deal will close in August should it pass regulatory approvals. Genuity Capital Markets and McCarthy Tetrault LLP are acting as advisors to GE in the transaction.