Property developer and real estate investment firm, Vesteda, successfully priced Europe’s first commercial mortgage-backed securitization (CMBS) of the year. It is also the first Dutch CMBS since the crisis began. Vesteda develops, rents, manages and sells properties from its own 28,000 unit real estate investment portfolio, valued €5bn. The Vesteda Residential Funding II BV program is a CMBS worth €350m The portfolio of underlying assets is rented multi-family apartment blocks and houses in the Netherlands. The fact that the deal is privately placed underlies the continued challenges in the market and the inability to fully gauge investor interest. The issue is comprised of A7 notes rated triple-A by Fitch Ratings, Standard & Poor’s and Moody’s Investors Service. ABN AMRO acted as sole lead manager for the transaction and Bishopsfield Capital Partners as rating adviser. The deal is unusual as the role of Bishopsfield is new to the Euro space, where a third party comments on the ratings activity of the credit rating agency. The notes have been placed with a single investor via a private placement and are underwritten by ABN AMRO. Vesteda shareholders are made up of Dutch institutional investors. The company maintains that its occupancy rate is 95% across properties, and has remained so over recent years. Write to Jacob Gaffney.