Mega REITs Predict More Volume in 2011

NEW YORK CITY-Watch out, private companies: Publicly-traded REITs are not only on rise, but they are getting bigger, too. Setting the tone at NAREIT’s “Mergers & Acquisitions” luncheon on Wednesday afternoon was the mega-merger of ProLogis and AMB Property Corp., which just closed forming a single company earlier in the week.

During a panel discussion, Walter Rakowich, CEO of ProLogis, said the deal is ProLogis’ sixth merger since 1998. “This is the third time we really sat down and spoken with AMB, and frankly, the stars really have to align,” he said, explaining that when he and AMB CEO Hamid Moghadam started talking about the merger, the two companies considered how to build a stronger, global platform. “The fact of the matter is, we thought about the operation synergies, which for us would be about $80 million a year,” he said. “We both had operating platforms where we saw pretty strong capital synergies, but also revenue synergies.”