Woba Dresden
| WOBA Dresden | |
|---|---|
| legal form | GmbH |
| Seat |
Dresden , Germany
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The WOBA Dresden GmbH was a real estate company in Dresden .
At the end of 2005, the company was managing around 48,000 of its own apartments and around 1,320 of its own commercial units. With its 475 employees and 17 trainees, it generated sales of around 184 million euros. After deducting costs and taxes, WOBA transferred around 9 million euros annually to the 100 percent shareholder, the city of Dresden, usually the operating result after deducting costs and taxes. Today it is majority owned by GAGFAH SA , passed to Vonovia through resale .
history
WOBA Dresden GmbH emerged in several steps from the municipal housing management (KWV) of the city of Dresden.
In 1990 the then 168,000 KWV apartments became the property of the City of Dresden. In accordance with the provisions of the Unification Treaty , the city had received back the municipal housing stock, but had to be responsible for loans that were recklessly sold by the old FRG to banking consortia with the laws on economic and monetary union on July 1, 1990. In contrast to other cities, the city then formed two companies: "Wohnbau Nordwest GmbH" and "Südost WOBA Dresden GmbH". In line with their name, the companies each received around half of the municipal housing stock. The city officially justified this, stating that the company would otherwise be too big if it were simply converted.
Not only because of the Old Debt Aid Act , but also in order to gain liquid funds as own shares for the necessary renovation, both companies each sold around 2/3 of their housing stock in the period 1990-2004 (a total of approx. 120,000 apartments), mainly to private investors .
Due to the shrinking stock, both companies were merged by the City of Dresden , forced by Mayor Ingolf Roßberg , in 2004 to form “WOBA Dresden GmbH” in the form of an umbrella company . The remaining companies became pure holding companies.
Sale to Fortress and debt relief for the city
On March 9, 2006, the Dresden city council decided to sell all shares in “WOBA Dresden GmbH” to the American investment company Fortress Investment Group , after the bidders not only committed themselves to a comprehensive “social charter” in advance, but also for it were willing to pay sensitive penalties in the event of their violation - which was also anchored in a notary. The result of the vote on the entire package, including the “Social Charter”, was on that day: 40 votes for, 29 against, 1 abstention (ie 70 votes out of a total of 71 voters).
This sale was approved on March 31, 2006 by the responsible regional council of Dresden, among other things because the city secured rights of influence within the framework of this “social charter”. Fortress paid a good 1.7 billion euros for the acquisition, considerably more than the book value of the housing stock at the time. After the repayment of internal company liabilities, there remained a net profit of over 960 million euros, which had increased to a total of 987 million euros due to interim interest and was reduced by the consulting services provided as part of the sales process. With this sale, Dresden became the first debt-free city in Germany, because the 987 million euros collected were used exclusively to repay the 741.4 million euros in debts of the municipal budget.
Further development since 2006
Since then, Woba Dresden has been a subsidiary of GAGFAH SA, which had been listed on the stock exchange since October 2006. Since January 2008, Woba has appeared exclusively under the name of its parent company GAGFAH SA, but was continued internally as an independent company.
At the end of March 2011, the city of Dresden decided to file a lawsuit for the nullification of the “social charter” relating to the real estate acquired in 2006 from the city's own housing association. In March 2012, GAGFAH and the City of Dresden agreed on a settlement that imposed far-reaching obligations on GAGFAH. In return, all proceedings were dropped. The Dresden city council approved the settlement agreement.
Resale
According to a press report from May 3, 2012, the real estate company Gagfah wanted to part with around 38,000 apartments. The units belonged to their daughter Woba Dresden and were worth almost 1.8 billion euros, reported the "Financial Times Deutschland". The investment bank Leonardo & Co. was commissioned with the sale, which represents a third of the housing portfolio of the company listed in the MDax, the report said. This sale failed.
GAGFAH in turn merged with Deutsche Annington to create Vonovia, in this way "Wohnbau Nordwest GmbH" became their 100% subsidiary.
Persistence of the name
For formal legal reasons and the resulting tax advantages, the company, like its predecessor companies, continues to exist formally as a “ shell ”.
literature
- Mike Nagler: Causes and effects of the denationalization of public institutions on urban development in the context of an overall socio-political development (using the example of the privatization of WOBA Dresden). Master's thesis at the HTWK Leipzig . August 2007 ( PDF , 5.96 MB)
Web links
- Sale of WOBA Dresden GmbH ( Memento from December 5, 2012 in the Internet Archive ), website of the City of Dresden
Individual evidence
- ↑ SPIEGEL Online, November 16, 2006: "No more debt"
- ↑ Press: GAGFAH - City of Dresden resolves lawsuit ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ State capital Dresden and Gagfah settle legal dispute and enter into a settlement. (No longer available online.) In: dresden.de. State capital Dresden, March 2, 2012, archived from the original on September 23, 2015 ; accessed on August 16, 2015 (press release). Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Dresden city council agrees with the Gagfah comparison " . In: Immobilien Zeitung online, March 16, 2012. Accessed on March 20, 2012.
- ↑ sueddeutsche.de: Gagfah in financial difficulties: Real estate company wants to sell 38,000 apartments
- ↑ Gagfah - GAGFAH GROUP. In: www.gagfah.de. Retrieved September 14, 2016 .
- ↑ Vonovia SE Annual Report 2015. Accessed on September 14, 2016 .
