Good evening,

It’s go time for Morgan Stanley and Barrenjoey’s bankers at Brookfield’s senior living business Aveo as its $3.5 billion sale process grinds into gear.

The sell-side has got the ball rolling, with targeted investor soundings under way and a 19-page flyer in front of interested parties. A sale flyer is typically seen as the launch point for an auction, but sources said Brookfield was telling parties to think of it as investor education and a precursor to kicking off a formal sale process.

Brookfield’s platform has about $14 billion in assets under management – of which circa 40 per cent is in premium office and the remainder in living and alternative sectors such as student accommodation. Aveo is a sizeable chunk of that, representing a 400,000-square-metre portfolio of 10,000-plus units in premium locations across the East Coast and 65 villages – and more than 3000 units in its pipeline – according to the sale flyer.

The flyer pitches Aveo as the “premier option” over and above its private-equity-owned competitors such as Infratil’s RetireAustralia, EQT’s Metlifecare and Stonepeak’s Arvida. Interested parties were told Aveo is the second-largest provider in the sector behind Lendlease’s Keyton with a 6 per cent market share. It operates with a $1.6 million average median house price, higher than its competitors, enjoys high operating margins from 100 per cent capital gains contracts and has a 94 per cent independent living unit occupancy rate, the flyer says.

Read the full story tomorrow and more on the Street Talk page.

• Quadrant Growth Fund deal maker invests in fast-growing medtech
• IFM Investors, ISPT shareholders agree terms for $240 billion merger
• Ellerston, Bondi Partner’s 1941 Fund backs Australian navy boat builder
• Mark McGowan-chaired Frontier Energy raising $40 million
• Energy Resources of Australia seeks at least $210 million, taps three brokers
• Longreach Capital anoints new King; signs UK deal

• Private equity circles Grant Thornton’s UK business
• AustralianSuper takes billion-dollar hit on venture capital failure
• Venture Capital group G Squared raises $US1 billion to invest in discounted start-up shares, Financial Times reports

Assurances of long-awaited rate cuts from the US Federal Reserve helped push the Australian sharemarket to within striking distance of its record high on Monday.

Click here for the latest equity market wrap.