Barclays to buy British specialist lender Kensington | Photo credits: © Barclays
by Iain Withers
LONDON, June 24 (Reuters) – Barclays has agreed a deal worth around 2.3 billion pounds ($2.8 billion) to take over property lender Kensington Mortgage Company.
This acquisition represents one of the most important recent transactions of the British bank and a major bet on the real estate market.
UK house prices have continued to rise in recent months despite runaway inflation weighing on households, but industry experts predict a slowdown later this year.
Kensington was sold by its private equity owners, Blackstone and Sixth Street.
The final price will depend on the size of Kensington’s mortgage portfolio at the time the deal closes, with Barclays estimating it would include around £2bn of home loans.
($1 = 0.8149 pounds) (Reporting Iain Withers; French version Federica Mileo, editing by Sophie Louet)