Mid-Market Operators Reshaping European Real Estate: Purestone, Deva Capital, and the New Dealmakers

Deva Capital deploys €1.6 billion as mid-market operators accelerate European dealmaking

Deva Capital, the investment arm of Santander Alternative Investments, now manages €1.6 billion in assets across real estate equity and debt, according to data compiled by GRI Institute and Deva Capital. The figure places the firm at the upper end of a rapidly expanding mid-market tier — a cohort of operators that includes Purestone Capital, Emefin's Domerson platform, and a network of experienced principals like Morgan Garfield, who are collectively redrawing the competitive landscape for European real estate capital deployment.

While headline transaction volumes remain dominated by mega-platforms and sovereign capital, the deal pipeline tells a different story at the €50–200 million ticket level. CBRE's European Mid-Year Market Outlook projects that European real estate transaction volumes will recover in 2025 and 2026, driven by a market dislocation that provides outsized opportunities for value-add mid-market operators. It is precisely this dislocation — a gap between distressed pricing and institutional re-entry — that firms like Purestone Capital and Deva Capital are positioning to exploit.

Mid-market operators now represent the most dynamic layer of European real estate capital formation. They combine sector specialism, principal alignment, and execution speed in ways that neither large institutional platforms nor sub-scale boutiques can reliably replicate.

Who are the key mid-market operators redefining European real estate?

The mid-market operator tier is not monolithic. It spans a spectrum from institutionally backed vehicles with multi-billion-euro mandates to lean principal-led platforms making targeted acquisitions. Understanding this spectrum is essential for any investor or counterparty seeking to navigate European deal flow.

Deva Capital: institutional firepower with operator agility

Deva Capital sits at the larger end of the mid-market, backed by the balance sheet and distribution network of Santander Alternative Investments. Its €1.6 billion in managed assets provides meaningful scale, yet the firm operates with a deal-by-deal conviction that distinguishes it from passive institutional allocators.

In March 2025, Deva Capital formed a £150 million joint venture with Clearbell Capital to acquire UK logistics assets, according to CRE Herald. The partnership is emblematic of the mid-market playbook: sector-specific conviction (logistics), a joint-venture structure that shares risk while preserving operator control, and a UK focus at a moment when sterling-denominated assets offered relative value.

Six months later, Deva Capital demonstrated its cross-sector reach. In September 2025, the firm acquired the Novotel London West hotel for £160 million in a joint venture with Arora Group, as reported by 4Hoteliers and HVS Hodges Ward Elliott. The Novotel transaction signals that institutionally backed mid-market operators are not confined to a single asset class; they follow yield and operational upside across sectors, from logistics to hospitality.

Purestone Capital: principal-led conviction in UK and Iberian markets

Purestone Capital operates at a different scale but with comparable strategic clarity. The private investment firm, focused on UK and Iberian real estate, is led by Managing Partner Rishi Khurana, who joined in 2025, according to GRI Institute and PropertyWire.

In February 2026, Purestone Capital acquired 80–85 Tottenham Court Road in London for £32.6 million — equivalent to £755 per square foot — as reported by PropertyWire and EIN Presswire. The acquisition, in one of central London's highest-footfall corridors, reflects a thesis that well-located mixed-use assets in prime urban nodes remain mispriced relative to their long-term income potential.

Purestone Capital's dual geographic focus on the UK and Iberia positions it to arbitrage pricing differentials across two markets at different stages of the cycle. While specific AUM figures for the firm are not publicly disclosed, the Tottenham Court Road deal illustrates the type of conviction-driven deployment that defines principal-led mid-market platforms.

Emefin and Domerson: Latin American capital with a European footprint

Emefin, the investment vehicle of the Peruvian Mulder family, represents a different archetype within the mid-market: family-office capital seeking permanent allocations to European real assets. Emefin's European real estate arm, known as Domerson, channels this long-duration capital into continental markets, according to data from Miura Partners and GRI Institute.

The family's investment philosophy extends beyond pure-play property. Emefin acquired the Iberian pet retailer Tiendanimal, which operates a significant real estate footprint of more than 65 stores across the peninsula, according to Miura Partners. For platforms like Emefin, the line between operating company investment and real estate investment is deliberately blurred — store networks, logistics hubs, and brand infrastructure are all expressions of a unified capital allocation strategy.

Morgan Garfield: the principal as institution

Morgan Garfield exemplifies another facet of the mid-market ecosystem: the senior industry principal whose personal brand and network function as a de facto platform. Garfield was appointed Chair of the British Property Federation (BPF) Retail Board effective March 7, 2025, according to the BPF and NewRiver REIT. He subsequently resigned from his role as Head of Capital Partnerships at NewRiver REIT on July 1, 2025, per GOV.UK Companies House filings.

The sequence — assuming a high-profile industry governance role and then departing an institutional employer — is a pattern frequently observed among mid-market principals repositioning for independent deal origination or advisory mandates. While no public information links Garfield to a specific new platform as of early 2026, his trajectory illustrates the human capital dynamics that drive mid-market formation: experienced operators stepping out of institutional structures to deploy capital with greater autonomy.

What regulatory shifts are enabling mid-market capital formation?

The mid-market thesis is not purely opportunistic. Two significant regulatory developments are structurally expanding the capital available to this tier of operators.

Solvency UK: unlocking insurer capital for real estate

The United Kingdom's Solvency UK reforms — the post-Brexit overhaul of the Solvency II regime — reformed the Matching Adjustment framework effective June 2024, with full implementation rolling through 2025. The critical change: insurers may now invest in assets with "highly predictable" cash flows, including real estate backed by leases, rather than only assets with strictly "fixed" cash flows.

This distinction matters enormously for mid-market operators. Long-leased logistics, hospitality, and retail assets — precisely the sectors where firms like Deva Capital and Purestone Capital are active — now qualify for insurer balance sheets under more favorable capital treatment. IPE Real Assets and Neuberger Berman project that insurers will increase allocations to listed and direct real estate debt in 2026 and 2027 as a consequence, favoring mid-market operators with credit strategies.

AIFMD II: harmonizing cross-border deployment

At the European level, Directive (EU) 2024/927 — known as AIFMD II — introduces new rules for loan-originating funds and harmonizes cross-border depositary services. The transposition deadline of April 16, 2026 means that mid-market debt funds, including those operated by platforms like Deva Capital, will face a recalibrated regulatory environment that simultaneously raises compliance standards and removes friction from cross-border capital deployment.

For mid-market operators, AIFMD II is a double-edged instrument. The compliance burden may squeeze sub-scale managers, but the harmonization of depositary rules should reduce the cost of deploying capital across multiple European jurisdictions — a structural advantage for firms with cross-border mandates.

How does the mid-market tier fit into the broader European investment landscape?

The emergence of a defined mid-market operator tier is not a cyclical phenomenon. It reflects a structural reordering of European real estate capital.

Large institutional platforms increasingly concentrate on core and core-plus strategies with minimum ticket sizes that exclude sub-€100 million opportunities. Boutique specialists, meanwhile, lack the balance sheet to pursue portfolio-scale transactions. The mid-market occupies the space between: large enough to underwrite meaningful risk, nimble enough to execute on compressed timelines, and specialized enough to generate alpha through operational improvement rather than financial engineering alone.

GRI Institute members have observed this dynamic in real time across club meetings and deal rooms, where mid-market principals are increasingly present as counterparties, co-investors, and sector specialists. The firms profiled here — Deva Capital with its €1.6 billion platform, Purestone Capital with its principal-led UK and Iberian strategy, Emefin's cross-border family-office model, and principals like Morgan Garfield navigating between institutional and independent roles — represent different expressions of the same structural trend.

The European market dislocation that CBRE identifies as the catalyst for 2025–2026 recovery is not a tide that lifts all boats. It is a selective opportunity set that rewards operators with sector expertise, execution certainty, and flexible capital structures. Mid-market platforms, by design, possess all three.

GRI Institute tracks capital flows and operator strategies across European real estate through its network of senior decision-makers. For further analysis and direct engagement with the principals shaping mid-market dealmaking, explore GRI's European programme of club meetings and events.