The Birmingham office of DLA Piper has completed three of the biggest real estate finance deals of the year out of the Midlands.

A total of around £350 million was involved and each was headed by the Finance group assisted by other specialists.

The largest saw DLA Piper act for lenders on the £240 million acquisition of motorway service station business, The Extra Group.

M3 Capital Partners purchased The Extra Group from administration.

It comprised eight operational motorway service stations and a development site on the M25 at Cobham which, when completed in 2012, will be the largest motorway service station in Europe.

DLA Piper advised RBS and Barclays, as joint arrangers, along with Santander on £180 million of funding to a Jersey borrower, with equity funding being provided by Evergreen Real Estate Partners LLC.

The service stations had formerly been owned by Swayfields Limited until administrators PricewaterhouseCoopers moved in.

The DLA Piper team advising on the deal was led by finance partner Brian Woolcock, who was assisted by James Crellin and Louise Phillips, with support from the Construction, Real Estate, Corporate and Tax departments, all based in Birmingham.

The second deal saw DLA Piper act for Santander in relation to a £52 million facility made available to Warwick-based IM Properties.

The finance was in connection with a portfolio comprising seven investment properties across the UK.

"And the third transaction saw DLA Piper acting for Barclays on an increased and extended £65 million revolving credit facility for St Modwen Properties PLC to support the acquisition of a portfolio of 11 income producing employment sites".

The Real Estate arm at DLA Piper also worked on both.

Mr Woolcock said: "These deals all involved significant amounts of money and it is a feather in the cap of the Birmingham office that these sorts of amounts can be handled out of the city.

"The wheels of commerce are back turning again and it is very pleasing that the Finance group is at the forefront."