Fibra Uno (FUNO), the real estate investment trust that rents out a diversified portfolio of properties, has arranged approximately 110 thousand square meters of offices to transform them into clinics and hospitals, in order to address the lack of health infrastructure that became evident in Mexico with the pandemic.

"Considering the lack of hospital infrastructure that the pandemic left us and the immediate ability to reinvent ourselves and the support we have had in the face of the crisis, this reconversion is the way we had to react immediately," said Gonzalo Robina, Deputy General Director Fibra Uno in a conference on the occasion of the celebration of "Investor Day".

FUNO has a portfolio of 1,300,000 square meters of profitable office space, whose occupancy was 74.0% in the third quarter of the year, a decrease of 40 basis points compared to the immediately previous quarter.

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During the event, Gonzalo Robina assured that "the office market is coming back", although its recovery will be a little slower compared to other real estate segments such as commercial. They indicated that as the return of children to school begins to occur, the return to the offices begins to be seen.

In the same context, company executives highlighted Fibra Uno's resilience in the face of strong crises, such as the one in 2020 due to the pandemic. They even estimated that their income has recovered, despite the fact that occupancy still does not reach the levels of 2019.

Robina pointed out that before the Covid-19 they had emphasized the cyclicality of the real estate business and they knew that a crisis was going to come but they did not know with certainty when and the interesting thing about this focus is that despite the context the company grew.

Faced with better prospects, they hope to close this year with 17,200 to 17,500 million pesos of net operating income (NOI).

Of interest: Demand for offices in Guadalajara increases by 6% during 3Q2021

"Few companies in the world have managed to be today above where they were in 2019. 

We have already recovered all the income we had before 2019, we are already above those numbers," agreed Jorge Pigeon, vice president of Capital Markets and Relations with FUNO investors.

He highlighted that the pillars that have allowed Fibra Uno to be resilient in the face of strong crises such as the one in 2020 due to the pandemic are based on location, competitive rents with diversification, as well as moderate leverage.

“We have higher income in rent per square meter today compared to what we had when the crisis started and we are still in rent per square meter above where we were in the crisis. In the occupation we still haven't recovered, ”Pigeon said.

The occupancy rate, at the end of the third quarter, stood at 92%, prior to the pandemic it reported levels of 95% on average for all its properties, such as shopping centers, industrial warehouses and offices. In total, Fibra Uno has 10.8 million square meters of profitable area.

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Original note