The story
The company's history dates back to two institutions: Preußische Landespfandbriefanstalt (founded in 1922) and Deutsche Wohnstättenbank AG (founded in 1923), both of which were based in Berlin. Deutsche Wohnstättenbank AG was renamed Deutsche Bau- und Bodenbank in 1926.
In the years of the Nazi rule, the bank grew rapidly thanks to the bridging loan business which mainly targeted the funding of settlement and housing construction. These sectors boomed following the massive increase of the armament industry that demanded accommodation for their workers, often designed as National Socialist ideal settlements. The prospect of business opportunities due to the boom of the armament industry also fostered the bank's department for industrial loans. Millions of Reichsmark were granted to companies like Ruhrgas AG, Vereinigte Stahlwerke AG or Daimler-Benz AG. At the time of the Nazi seizure of power in 1933, already 63 of 267 employees belonged to the Nazi Party. While chairman of the supervisory board Otto Kämper was a member as well and publicly praised the success of the government in the field of housing, democrats such as Arnold Knoblauch or Eberhard Wildermuth, who was in contact with conspirators of the 20 July plot, were still holding a seat on the supervisory board until World War II.
Preußische Landespfandbriefanstalt was given the name Deutsche Pfandbriefanstalt in 1954. In 1979, Deutsche Pfandbriefanstalt acquired a majority interest in Deutsche Bau- und Bodenbank. It traded as public limited company under the name Deutsche Pfandbrief- und Hypothekenbank AG from 1989, before going public in 1991 and opening its first foreign branch in Amsterdam in the same year.
In 1999, Deutsche Pfandbrief- und Hypothekenbank AG was renamed DePfa Deutsche Pfandbrief Bank AG and transferred all property activities to Deutsche Bau- und Bodenbank, which was also given the name DePfa Bank AG BauBoden at this time. In 2002, the bank was divided into Aareal Bank AG (formerly Deutsche Bau- und Bodenbank), a property finance bank with headquarters in Wiesbaden, and DePfa BANK plc, a public finance bank based in Dublin. Since 2006, the company has focused on the Commercial Property Financing and Consulting/Services segments.
From Wikipedia’s article on Aareal Bank, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.5