Alternative investment products have been slowly growing in popularity for some time now in CEE. As clients look for new types of services from advisory firms, this trend is here to stay. Jonathan Hallett MRICS, Executive Partner | Head of Central & Eastern Europe at Cushman & Wakefield talked to Property Forum about business lines, technology and competition.

The rate of shopping centre development in Europe is slowing, with completions down 23% year-on-year at 3.8 million sqm 2017, according to Cushman & Wakefield’s latest European Shopping Centres report.

Telekom Romania announced the sale of two plots of land located in the Floreasca area of Bucharest to One United Properties. The transaction price exceeded €18 million.

Andrei Văcaru has been promoted to Head of Capital Markets JLL Romania, effective 1st August 2018. Andrei has over 13 years’ experience in the Romanian real estate market which spans over different segments including capital markets, consultancy, retail leasing and retail tenant representation.

More than 180,000 sqm of retail space was added to the Polish retail market in H1 2018 and another 330,000 sqm is expected to be completed by year-end 2018. This will represent an increase of over 25% year-on-year, bringing Poland’s total retail stock to more than 14,800,000 sqm. The new supply will be concentrated in cities with fewer than 100,000 inhabitants, accounting for 40% of this year’s openings. Cushman & Wakefield has published another edition of its MarketBeat report.

In H1 2018, demand on Poland’s industrial market was 2 million sqm - this is the best ever result recorded in the market’s history. In addition, industrial stock in Poland has now exceeded 14 million sqm, according to JLL.

The overall European logistics yield dropped 14bps to 5.95% in Q2 2018, the first time it has fallen below 6% since Cushman & Wakefield began consistently tracking the three main property sectors in 1992, according to the firm’s DNA of Real Estate report.

Prologis has begun construction of a new 38,620 square meter facility at its fast-expanding Prologis Park Prague-Airport.

Cresa, the world’s largest tenant-only commercial real estate firm, has opened an office in Krakow. Cresa already has five offices across Poland: in Warsaw, Wrocław, Tricity, Łódź and Krakow. Its Krakow office is located in High5ive.

Globalworth has secured a €46 million loan from BCR, which will be used for developing Connected, Renault’s new HQ in Bucharest.