Private equity giant Blackstone is returning to the North American rental housing market, having agreed to acquire Canadian real estate firm Tricon Residential in a take-private deal with a $3.5bn price tag.
Blackstone, via Blackstone Real Estate Partners X and Blackstone Real Estate Income Trust (BREIT), is to pay $11.25 (approximately CAD15.17) per share to acquire all outstanding common shares of Tricon.
The purchase price represents a premium of 30% to Tricon’s closing share price on the NYSE on 18 January 2024, the last trading day prior to the announcement of the transaction, and a 42% premium to the volume weighted average share price on the NYSE over the previous 90 days. Post-closing, BREIT will maintain its approximately 11% ownership stake in the business.
Tricon provides rental homes and apartments in high-growth markets throughout the US such as Atlanta, Charlotte, Dallas, Tampa and Phoenix as well as in Toronto, Canada.
Under Blackstone’s ownership, the company plans to complete its $1bn development pipeline of new single-family rental homes in the US and $2.5bn of new apartments in Canada (together with its existing joint venture partners). The company also intends to enhance the quality of existing single-family homes in the US through an additional $1bn of planned capital projects over the next several years.
