Diversified real estate investment trust (Reit) Accelerate Property Fund has poached sought after Delta Property Fund’s executive Marelise de Lange as its new CFO.
She will replace Pieter Grobler who served on an interim basis from April after Dimitri Kyriakides retired at the end of March.
“The board congratulates Marelise on her appointment and looks forward to her contribution to the company,” said Accelerate.
The company is valued at R1.26bn on the JSE. It owns assets including Fourways Mall, Cedar Square and Citibank offices in Johannesburg.
De Lange, a chartered accountant with more than 10 years of experience, will take over from August 1.
She comes into the new role with Accelerate facing numerous headwinds.
For the six months to end-September 2022, Accelerate’s total debt stood at R4.5bn. Of this, 70% was hedged compared with 86.3% in 2021. It had R200m in undrawn facilities.
Accelerate recently released a statement saying that it would be issuing a rights offer to raise R50m to improve its financial position and enable the repositioning of its Fourways Mall.
De Lange previously also worked at fellow JSE-listed companies Texton Property Fund and Rebosis Property Fund.
Delta Property Fund confirmed De Lange’s resignation in a separate statement on Wednesday, adding that her last day at the company will be on July 25.
“The board wishes to express its appreciation to Marelise for her significant contribution during her tenure at the company and wishes her well in her future endeavours,” it said.
“The board has embarked on a recruitment process for a new CFO and will in due course update shareholders accordingly.”
Delta last month sold four properties for R50m to DMFT Property Developers, whose ultimate beneficial shareholder is businessman David Mabilu.
Delta is worth just R178m on the JSE, its stock having shed 96% in the past five years.
The company missed a golden opportunity three years ago to build a scalable group after its merger talks with Rebosis Property Fund fell though.
The failed merger would have created a R29bn property group that would have had greater scale and financial muscle.
Rebosis is today in business rescue and has embarked on a fire sale of its assets.
With Kabelo Khumalo
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