Property Firm Owned By Philippines’ Richest Man To Raise $176 Million From Shopping Mall, Office REIT IPO

Vista Land & Lifescapes—the real estate firm controlled by the billionaire and former politician Manuel Villar—plans to raise as much as 9.2 billion pesos ($176 million) from the initial public offering of VistaREIT, which will own some of the group’s shopping malls and office buildings across the Philippines.

The group plans to sell up to 3.66 billion shares (including an overallotment option of as much as 333.75 million shares) at a maximum price of 2.50 pesos each via the IPO. The shares will be sold by Vista Land subsidiaries including Masterpiece Asia Properties, Manuela Corp., Communities Pampanga, Crown Asia Properties and Vista Residences, the company said in a statement. Subject to regulatory approvals, VistaREIT aims to list on the Philippine bourse in May or June, according to a company representative.

Vista Land and its subsidiaries injected a portfolio of 10 shopping malls and two office buildings with a gross leasable area of 256,404 square meters into VistaREIT. The retail properties are integrated across housing projects built by Vista Land across Metro Manila and the nearby provinces of Cavite and Bulacan, while the office buildings are located on the edge of Makati central business district and Bacoor City, south of the Philippine capital of Manila.

“The properties delivered sustained rental income growth even at the height of the pandemic given the essential nature of its mall tenants,” VistaREIT said, adding that occupancy rates at its properties range from 93% to 100%.

Villar, 72, is the chairman of Vista Land. The former politician—who once ran for president—is the Philippines’ richest man with a net worth of $8.6 billion, according to the World’s Real-Time Billionaires list compiled by Forbes. In the past three years, Villar listed his home improvement chain AllHome and convenience store chain AllDay Marts. In January, his Advanced Media Broadcasting Systems took over the television broadcast frequencies previously used by ABS-CBN, which was once the Philippines’ top media company until the government forced it off air two years ago.