Chief Executive Officer, Xior Student Housing
CEO Talks | Christian Teunissen: 'By 2022 we could have 2 billion euros in our portfolio'
During this first CEO Talks of 2020, Serge Mampaey talks with Christian Teunissen, CEO of Xior, the successful landlady of the Brussels Stock Exchange.
About Christian Teunissen
Christian Teunissen, CEO of Xior Student Housing, appeared on the Belgian program CEO Talks on April 3, 2025, and in a previous episode from February 2020. In the 2025 interview, Teunissen discussed the supply-demand imbalance in student housing, stating that "the supply is much smaller than the demand" and that the gap is widening due to the current crisis and high interest rates. He noted that in Belgium, Xior achieves a high operational margin through scaling, such as adding nearby buildings to an existing team. Teunissen also compared the European continent to other regions, saying that university tuition is "quasi free" in Europe, with fees ranging from around €1,000 in Belgium to zero in Germany and Denmark, which he described as a "subsidized system." In the 2020 interview, Teunissen said Xior had set a guidance to grow its portfolio from €1.2 billion to €2 billion by 2022. He stated that the company had entered Spain and Portugal in March 2019, markets with twice the student population of Belgium and the Netherlands, and that he considered further geographic expansion at that time "not healthy." Teunissen also mentioned that Xior's loan-to-value ratio was 45%, with a legal maximum of 65% and a bank agreement limit of 60%, indicating "a little bit of firepower" for continued growth.
Transcript (11 segments)
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Interviewer0:00
Welcome to the new year and to our Ciaokes. Next to me sits Christian Teunissen, the CEO of the specialist in student housing, Xior. Welcome Mr. Teunissen. You have announced such beautiful annual results. Earnings per share rose almost 10 percent, while the number of shares increased by 39 percent. How long can you sustain that growth path?
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Christian Teunissen0:20
Yes, the market is certainly active in student housing. We naturally started in Belgium, then we went to the Netherlands. Last year in March we entered Spain and Portugal, the Iberian Peninsula. When we see that the student market in Belgium and the Netherlands is about one million, and we look at Spain and Portugal where there are double the number of students, but we have only just started and there is also a huge shortage of professional student housing, it is logical that there are still many opportunities and we have certain goals to achieve within a few years. Yes, and we also published our annual results yesterday and we gave guidance for 2022. Currently we have a portfolio of about 1.2 billion, and we aim to reach 2 billion by 2022. Now as a real estate company...
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Interviewer1:25
You are of course subject to interest rates. How interest rate sensitive is Xior actually?
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Christian Teunissen1:29
Actually, yes, interest rates indeed have an effect on real estate, and that is very logical. Now we have hedged ourselves against that interest rate increase for seven and a half years, so we can really take a hit. Our debt is currently 45%. Legally we can go up to 65%, and the agreement with the banks is up to 60% maximum, so we still have some firepower to continue growing. And afterwards, if we would have to take out new credits, then we would indeed have to look at the rising interest rates. That means that if we are currently at about 2% interest, and I see that we would have to pay 4% or 5%, the growth of the company could stall. That does not mean that we cannot keep our promises to the investor. We continue to strive for a growing dividend yield. Now many investors buy you for the dividend yield. Can you give predictions? When we went public we paid a dividend of 0.15. We are now at a dividend yield of 1.3%. That shows that we give a growing dividend yield and we will continue to go that far.
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Interviewer3:00
Okay, you are now active in four countries: Belgium, the Netherlands, but also Spain and Portugal. Will more countries be added in the near future?
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Christian Teunissen3:10
Yes, so in March last year, as I said, we just entered Spain and Portugal, and the market where there are double the number of students compared to Belgium and the Netherlands. We have already bought for about 310 million euros in assets and developments, so there is still a lot to do. I also think that our operations and team need to further professionalize and expand, and I think we will still have a lot of work to do. We have it under control, but there are still very big challenges for us, and I think it is not healthy to now enter a fifth or sixth country. That would be too much. Geographical expansion is not immediately on the horizon, but you never know, of course. We continue to monitor the rest of the market. We are the only listed player in student real estate on the European continent, and that means we have to do our homework. We keep looking around. We keep looking at where there are opportunities. There is competition, for example in Germany a big player is starting in student housing, and maybe they could cross over to Spain.
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Interviewer4:29
Are there actually already big differences between the typical Spanish, Dutch, or Belgian student?
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Christian Teunissen4:35
Then there are certainly differences, but if I look at the portfolio of Xior, then in Belgium we have about 40% Belgian students, so it's a Belgian portfolio. When we go to the Netherlands, Spain, Portugal, then we have perhaps 80% international students. So it's not so much the local Dutch students who rent a room with us, but we have for the majority international students. To give an example, in Spain there is a huge attraction to Asian countries, so there are many Asians who rent with us online, which is easy management for us because everything is rented online. Whereas in Belgium we have Belgian students who come to look at the room and sometimes come back with their parents to sign the contract. It's a different mentality.
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Interviewer5:24
A different mentality. They often call you the landlady of the Brussels stock exchange. Do you consider that a title of honor, or would you rather not see that name in the newspaper?
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Christian Teunissen5:32
Yes, we do consider it an honorary title. I feel very honored.
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Interviewer5:36
You have found the time, so we actually consider it a very nice reward for what we do, and I think it certainly covers the meaning. And it makes us a bit less serious. We are engaged with students, so it can stay a bit student-like. Okay, perfect. Then we'll say goodbye to Mr. Teunissen. Okay, we'll be back with a new episode of Ciaokes on Thursday, February 20th. And then Nicholas Zuiver, the CEO of the maritime group Experts, will be our guest.