Investment banking giants Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley have raised almost $7B of equity for new real estate funds that, combined, will have more than $10B of capital to invest.

Goldman Sachs has raised $4.2B of equity for Broad Street Real Estate Credit Partners III, its latest real estate debt fund. Goldman raised $2.3B from external limited partners, put in $1.7B from its own balance sheet and Goldman employees put up a further $200M, according to Private Equity Real Estate magazine.

That is the largest investment Goldman has ever made in one of its own funds.

“The fund’s scale and flexibility allows us to be an originate-and-hold lender, providing highly customised loans from $100M to in excess of $500M throughout the U.S. and Europe,” Goldman Merchant Banking Division Global Head Of Real Estate Credit Peter Weidman said.

Overall, Goldman's fund has a total of $6.7B in combined equity and debt to invest.

At Morgan Stanley, SEC documents show the firm raised $2.7B in December for North Haven Real Estate Fund IX Global, its latest opportunity fund. PERE said this completes the equity raising for the fund.

It is likely to raise about the same amount in debt, bringing the fund's total to $5.5B.

For both firms, the equity raising cements their return to the world of large-scale real estate funds following difficulties during the financial crisis.