September 24 – The ambition of Real Madrid president Florentino Perez to remodel the iconic Bernabeu stadium looks closer to be achieved with the club saying that a revamped stadium would be worth and extra €100-150 million a year in increased match day and stadium revenue.
The cost of the refurbishment is set at €500 million and Perez is seeking approval to borrow that money from banks at a repayment rate of about €25 million a year over a 25 or 30-year period.
The request to authorise a loan will go before club members this Sunday at an extraordinary general meeting.
The plans for the new development would increase the height of the current stadium by 12 meters in order to fit a retractable roof and include redesigned grandstands as well as multiple new commercial, leisure and enterainment areas.
Opened in October 1944, this would be the first major remodelling of the Bernabeu. The stadium is reckoned to be the second most visited attraction in Madrid after the Prado Museum.
The finance plan as it is proposed looks easily affordable for the club which last year had revenue of about €750 million. Initially Perez had expected to finance the stadium in part through a naming rights deal with middle eastern oil firm IPIC. That deal fell through but the naming rights are still available and the loan, at a proposed 2.5%, looks cheap. If approved the club said the renovation would being in 2019.
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