The R146.2 million acquisition includes agreements for the rental enterprise and the building situated at 35 Rissik Street, Marshalls Town, City of Johannesburg.

The property has a total gross lettable area of 11 738m2 of which 830m2 is retail space and 10 908m2 being office space.

Shaun Rai, one of the founding shareholders and Executive Director of Ascension, confirms the company is maintaining its focused acquisition drive. "The acquisition is in line with the company's strategy of focusing on larger, centrally located commercial office buildings in Pretoria, Johannesburg, Cape Town and Nelspruit and provides an ideal opportunity to acquire a well located government-tenanted building with a long lease expiry profile at an attractive yield."

The fund has shown phenomenal growth in its first year as a JSE-listed property fund growing its property portfolio by R2.8 billion since listing in June 2012.

Ascension Properties Limited, founded in 2006, is a black managed and substantially black owned Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) listed on the JSE. The company focuses on centrally located larger commercial office buildings in South Africa with a strong focus towards government and other empowerment sensitive tenants.

The fund converted to a Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) in line with the new REIT legislation in June 2013.

The company's capital structure consists of A and B Linked Units. Each Unit consists of one share and one debenture. The A-Linked Units have first right to the net distributable income of the fund with distribution of 38 cents per unit for the 12 months to 30 June 2013, growing at 5% per annum for the first five years with growth thereafter at the lower of inflation or 5%.

The B-Linked Units receive the residual net income of the portfolio, with a higher anticipated growth in distributions (20% in 2014) compared to the A-Linked Units.