The California State Teachers’ Retirement System is backing Kildare’s second European real estate fund with a $300m (€269.2m) commitment.

The US pension fund approved a commitment into the Kildare European Partners II fund, which focuses on distressed assets.

The pension fund said it was β€œalways looking for investment opportunities, including within the current Brexit environment”.

CalSTRS’s commitment represents a large expansion of its existing relationship with Kildare.

The pension fund made a $54.5m investment in Kildare European Partners I in 2014.

The new commitment will give CalSTRS 15% ownership in the fund, which is targeting a $2bn capital raise, according to the pension fund’s website.

Most of its assets will be in Germany, the UK, Italy and the Netherlands.

The fund is targeting a gross IRR of at least 20%, with deals ranging between $100m and $200m in size.

These will include investment in a variety of distressed loans or real estate assets at a discount.

CalSTRS made the Kildare investment as part of $900m in new real estate commitments approved by the pension fund.

The pension fund also invested $100m in the open-ended, core JP Morgan Asia Pacific Property Fund and $200m in the DivcoWest Fund V fund.

DivcoWest will be investing all of its capital in US office and R&D assets.

A further $300m was placed into the Lone Star Real Estate Fund V, which will invest in a broad range of distressed investment opportunities in developed markets.