Investment manager Corestate Capital Holding S.A. has agreed on a new partnership with Bain Capital Credit. Bain Capital Credit is a leading global credit specialist with approximately €41 billion in assets under management. The agreement establishes a financing partnership in Poland within the micro living sector, specifically to co-invest in properties and convert them into student housing. The partnership has the initial capability to develop up to €500 million GAV. The agreement also includes asset and property management contracts.

First Property Group has entered into a contract for the sale of one of its properties, a 50.3% interest in Chałubińskiego 8 (CH8), an office tower in Warsaw, Poland, at a price of €44 million. Completion of the contract is deferred until the treatment of VAT relating to the sale has been approved by the Polish tax authorities, which is expected by 31 March 2020. The name of the buyer has not been disclosed.

Atenor announced the obtaining of the building permit for the @EXPO project, located in the north-west of Bucharest that includes the development of approximately 49,000 sqm of rentable space. The complex will meet the highest standards of sustainability for BREEAM "Excellent" certification. In particular, it will use innovative technologies to reduce operating costs and increase occupant comfort.  

Graz-based Supernova Group is continuing its expansion in Slovenia by buying ten shopping centres of Centrice Real Estate GmbH (a company of the American Lone Star fund). The latter had taken over the properties in 2016 from the Austrian company, Heta, the liquidation company of Hypo Alpe Adria within the framework of a major overall transaction. This Qlandia package was the centrepiece of the portfolio and incorporates market-leading shopping centres in several Slovenian regions.

Globalworth Industrial, the industrial and logistics sub-brand of Globalworth, has begun construction at Constanța Business Park, the largest mixed-use project in Romania. The business park is being developed on a plot of some 100 hectares and will include industrial and logistics, production and service space, as well as office buildings and an intermodal hub.

Star Capital Investments has acquired Lighthouse Towers, a Class A office building in Prague 7’s thriving Holešovice district. The seller was Deka Immobilien. The property comprises two stand-alone buildings joined at the underground parking level, where 360 parking spaces are provided.

In 2019, the Polish housing market experienced an acceleration and increase of projects in the rental and private student housing sectors. Poland is still on the radar of large foreign investors and some of them have been able to conclude spectacular deals. Although potential institutional buyers still aren’t able to purchase turn-key portfolios on an expected scale, and entering the market mostly means building new stock, the institutional rental sector is drawing more and more interest and will undoubtedly become a desired category of safe assets in 2020.

According to JLL data, office take-up in Warsaw grew by 270,000 sqm year-on-year in Q3 2019. At the same time, 185,000 sqm of space was delivered to the market during recent months. This means that the need for additional space exceeded new supply by as much as 85,000 sqm. This impressive performance has further fueled developer activity. 790,000 sqm of space is under construction, with a significant proportion of this total already being leased.

Romanian retailer Profi’s network is expanding rapidly, inaugurating new stores while also taking over already-existing networks. The most recent development involves acquiring 18 supermarkets in Prahova and Dambovita counties from local peer Pram Maya. This transaction was already approved by the Competition Council. CBRE assisted Maya in the transaction process.

Major real estate developers continued to be active in Bucharest throughout 2019, providing the land needed for new projects consisting of over 6,000 apartments and 130,000 square meters of offices. Overall, in 2019, 24 major transactions were made in Bucharest with land intended for the development of residential, office or mixed projects, some of them having the potential to include a hotel component, according to Cushman & Wakefield Echinox.