NEW YORK CITY-The Bank of Ireland and Anglo Irish Bank Corp. are both looking to get rid of their US property businesses as part of deleveraging necessitated by the ongoing debt crisis in Ireland.

The Bank of Ireland has retained Holliday Fenoglio Fowler to advise on the sale of its US property business, centered in New York, Boston and Washington, DC and worth approximately $1.5 billion. According to a spokesperson for the bank, the move is part of ongoing deleveraging brought about by the crisis in Ireland.

“We’ve already announced some deleveraging in the UK for various niche international businesses and it’s just an extension of that,” the spokesperson tells GlobeSt.com. “We’ve announced the deleveraging and sale of our project finance book, excluding the Irish book a short while ago,” she says. “We’ve also announced Burdale, our out-of-base lenders as well, so that is also on the market.”

She declined to give any breakdown of what types of assets comprised the US property business. In a prepared statement, however, Paul McDonnell, head of the Global Property Finance Book at the bank, touched upon the level at which they have been operating. “The US property finance business is a high performing and profitable book of assets to leading sponsors,” McDonnell said.

Anglo Irish Bank Corp. is also looking to sell its portfolio of US commercial real estate loans, according to reports. That portfolio is worth a reported $10.5 billion. Eastdil Secured has been hired to facilitate that sale, but neither Eastdil nor HFF returned calls from GlobeSt.com seeking comment.