At the end of last July, FYNSAUpper completed the sale of two residential rental assets in Houston, Texas, called Morgan & Wilcox. These properties were the first acquisition of the FYNSA Upper Renta Residencial US I Investment Fund, made in July 2021.

The transaction is a concrete example of the opportunities for investing in the U.S. real estate market. To discuss this and the Fund's strategies with its clients, FYNSAUpper organized meetings in Chile and Peru with Sohail Hassan, co-founder and managing partner of MarketSpace Capital, the firm with which FYNSAUpper invested in Morgan & Wilcox.

Topics such as the search and evaluation model for real estate opportunities of MarketSpace and what the interest rate environment looks like were central to the meetings.

"Also, investors in general were interested in knowing at what stage of the U.S. economic cycle what stage of the U.S. economic cycle we are in, whether we are in a real recession or just a technical recession," he says. we are in, if we are in a real recession or just a technical one," says Pablo Massera, FYNSA's real estate Pablo Massera, FYNSA's real estate manager.

The Morgan & Wilcox operation is, in this sense, an excellent case study.

"There were 624 units, which we bought for US$87,000 per door, and which less than a year later we sold for US$120,673. This meant an IRR for investors of 71%, an equity multiple of 1.7; this brings the return to our investors to 31%," Hassan explained.

"This is not just one particular case, but is in addition to similar results in 13 other real estate deals where the investment cycle has been completed, led by MarketSpace," says Juan Eduardo Biehl, partner at FYNSA. Juan Eduardo Biehl, partner at FYNSA.

The profits from this investment were available for reinvestment in other projects, allowing the company to defer capital gains taxes. Approximately US$22 million is ready to be invested in other projects.. "At this point, we don't need to raise equity, which puts us in a very advantageous position," says Hassan. "What we're seeing now is a debt environment with rising interest rates: debt is now the asset and property is the liability."

"The success of the deal is a result of a combination of our strategy of addressing opportunities and identifying niche markets'Hassan stresses.

MarketSpace is focused on opportunities in the state of Texas, which is experiencing a period of great economic expansion. "Texas gets a thousand people every day," Hassan says.

"It's a combination of the cost of living and the business climate, which is very favorable. That's one of the reasons Texas is attracting a lot of big companies, like Tesla, which is setting up offices in Austin."

In this context, investments are directed to multifamily projects. "The residential sector, unlike office or retail, has great resilience," says Biehl.

"Leases in the U.S. are up an average of 15%, and in selected markets such as Miami or Austin, leases are up 25%," Hassan stresses.25%," Hassan stresses. Given the housing shortage, residential rental is one of the most conservative strategies for entering the U.S. market.

The results of this tour to explain opportunities in the U.S. real estate market have been very satisfactory. "The meetings we have had with clients have been very productive," says Hassan. "I was very surprised at the level of questions they asked us, they have been very sophisticated. It was clear that these people had done their research on the U.S. market. U.S. marketas well as the interest rate environment."

"My impression is that many of these questions arose because no one has come here to explain how the U.S. real estate market works. It's an opportunity to gain visibility and build relationships to invest in these types of opportunities."Biehl concludes.