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Blackstone Real Estate Income Trust exits self-storage to boost data centers
The REIT sold its final 79 self-storage assets for $852.3M in net proceeds and moved $3.3B into QTS development, which it said is largely leased to investment grade tenants.
Blackstone Real Estate Income Trust has officially exited the self-storage business, selling its last 79 self-storage assets, according to its second-quarter earnings report. The deal generated $852.3M in net proceeds and a net gain of $177.3M.
Bisnow notes that most of the sold properties, totaling 5 million square feet, were acquired by the REIT’s buyers in 2019 and 2020. The REIT previously began exiting self-storage about three years ago, when it sold a 9 million square foot portfolio to Public Storage for $2.2B.
During Q2, the company said it redeployed capital toward its data center platform, QTS, spending $3.3B in development. The REIT said those data centers are fully leased in substantially all cases to investment grade tenants, and that QTS’ leasing is up more than 50% year-over-year.
The report also highlighted additional asset sales during the quarter, with BREIT selling 20 rental housing properties and 27 industrial properties. Combined with self-storage dispositions, those transactions brought $2.1B in net proceeds and a net realized gain of $294M, while the REIT recorded a $466M net loss in the second quarter compared with a $569M loss a year earlier.