Massive change looms for Center Parcs as owner begins talks with new investors
THE owner of Center Parcs has started fresh talks with investors over a sale of a stake in the business, according to reports.
Brookfield Property Partners, which has owned the chain since 2015, has been looking to sell the business.
A stake of the holiday giant could be sold reports .
The talks are at an early stage according to the report and may not result in a deal.
Broookfield, a Canadian private equity group, has been looking to sell the entire business with a price tag of £5billion as it evaluates the future of Center Parcs UK and Ireland.
A string of bidders reportedly interest in sites include CVC Capital Partners, the Singaporean sovereign wealth fund GIC, and real estate specialist KSL Capital Partners.
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The latest news of a potential sale of just part of the business indicates potential buyers are not willing to pay that price.
Brookfield was approached by The Sun Online but declined to comment.
Centre Parcs has five locations across the country.
The leisure resort confirmed it intends to go ahead with a new location somewhere else in the south-east of England.
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It previously abandoned proposals for a new 900-lodge site near Crawley in West Sussex.
The Crawley plans were scrapped in February after environmental surveys suggested the site was "not a suitable location" for a resort.
Center Parcs, founded in the Netherlands in 1968, and attracts millions of visitors each year.
There are locations in Sherwood Forest, in Nottinghamshire, Whinfell Forest, in Cumbria's Lake District, Longleat Forest, in Wiltshire, Elveden Forest, in Suffolk and Woburn Forest, in Bedfordshire.
There is also a Center Parcs resort near Ballymahon, in Ireland, which opened most recently in 2019.
Center Parcs UK is a separate business from Center Parcs Europe, which has holiday villages in Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany and France.
The European business is owned by Blackstone Group which sold the UK part of the business to Brookfield in 2015 for £2.4billion.