Lend Lease Selling Bluewater

Lend Lease Corp. is not just getting out of the U.S real estate market, which it announced two weeks ago. Lend Lease chief executive Greg Clarke said in an interview with Australian television that the company wants to sell 30 percent of its stake in Bluewater, Europe's largest shopping center and one of the premier retail destinations in the globe. It is the only retail property Lend Lease owns in England.

A spokesman for the company confirmed that Lend Lease is interested in making a sale, but that it was in no rush to get a deal done and that the sale would probably not be completed before the end of the year.

The center is owned by four parties. Lend Lease owns a 30 percent stake, but controls an additional 25 percent stake through a fund called the Lend Lease Retail Partnership. The fund will retain that interest. Prudential Real Estate Investments owns a 35 percent stake and British pension fund Hermes Property Asset Management owns the other 10 percent.

British real estate analysts estimate the 30 percent stake could sell for as much as $665 million, putting the value of the entire property at upwards of $2 billion.

Bluewater covers 1.6 million square feet and includes more than 300 stores. Lend Lease bought the site in 1994 and invested more than $582 million in constructing the center, which opened in 1999.