Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield URW announces the appointment of Jakub Skwarlo to the role of COO Central Europe, with responsibility for overseeing the company’s business in Czech Republic, Austria, Germany, Poland and Slovakia. He will be based in Warsaw and also join the company’s Executive Committee.

Doron Klein, the CEO of AFI Europe Romania and The Czech Republic, has been appointed as Deputy CEO of AFI Europe group, in addition to his current position. 

Hungarian property investor and developer Indotek Group has been granted permission from the Croatian authorities to buy the Jelsa Resort, a huge hotel complex on Hvar Island. The complex offers 1,400 rooms but needs to be refurbished, vg.hu reports.

Avison Young presented the results of the investment market in Poland for the first 5 months of 2023. The volume of closed transactions announced to the public from the beginning of this year to the end of May amounted to only around €800 million, while in 2021 and 2022 in the same period, its value amounted to over twice as much. There were no large transactions, which in the first quarter of 2022 accounted for 75% of the total volume. Many buyers are trying to take advantage of the market situation and are bidding well below property valuations, hoping to get a good deal, but owners are taking their time to sell. Avison Young experts - Paulina Brzeszkiewicz-Kuczyńska (Research and Data Manager) and Marcin Purgal (Senior Director, Investment) - expect that in the second half of this year, the commercial real estate market in Poland will be dominated by opportunistic and value-add assets in every sector.

Colliers’ latest report finds that varying return-to-office approaches post-COVID, underlying fundamentals of city functionality, approaches towards ESG-compliance differences and how markets have reacted to shifts in inflation and interest rates have created a significant divergence in office investment volumes, pricing, and appetite globally. In Europe, vacancy sits at a steady 8.1% and office occupancy rates have returned mainly to pre-pandemic levels of 65% on average across Europe.

The total stock of modern retail spaces in Romania reached 4.11 million sqm in the first quarter of 2023 following the delivery of two new retail parks with a combined leasable area of 22,000, according to a report by CBRE. 

Proxenta's latest residential project, Kesselbauer, is being finalised these weeks. The luxury residence right in the centre of Bratislava has already completed all the construction works and only the landscaping in the courtyard remains. The project is now in the approval phase and the approval process is expected to be completed in a few weeks, real estate portal YIM.BA reports.

In 2023, the residential real estate market in Bulgaria is expected to remain calmer and more balanced than during the dynamic previous year. According to real estate agency Arco Real Estate, the forecast is for a slight cooling of interest due to factors such as inflation, the change, and the rise in mortgage rates, as well as the ongoing war in Ukraine.

Real estate market players are starting to recognise the importance of data but finding the right way to collect, analyse and utilise it is still often a challenge. Matej Leskovar, Managing Director at Slovenia-based software solution provider Imagine d.o.o. talked to Property Forum about this topic in detail.

The 12th JLL Charity Beach Volleyball Tournament of the Real Estate Industry will be held on August 3 at the Monta Beach Volley Club in Warsaw. The goal of this year's event will be to support the construction of the Ronald McDonald House at the Children’s Memorial Health Institute. Property Forum is a media partner of this event.