CEE investment volumes for the first half of 2020 reached ca. €6.26 billion. This figure was boosted by two large portfolios totalling in excess of €2.2 billion, with Poland and the Czech Republic taking a 78% share of the CEE-6 total. According to Colliers International's latest report, investor appetite remains strong for CEE but a cautious approach is still being applied as markets try to settle. 

Due to the lockdown caused by the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, most companies embraced a remote working model and scaled-down business activity. How did this affect the Polish office market? Cushman & Wakefield presented a summary of H1 2020.

Gross demand on the Polish industrial market reached 2.2 million sqm in H1 2020 which is the best result for the first half of the year in the market’s history. New leases and expansions accounted for nearly 1.7 million sqm, which is a 30% improvement y-o-y. This means that Poland is the only country in Europe to have seen net demand growth in H1 2020, according to JLL.

Panattoni has announced another Warsaw development, which is to be built on a 1.9 ha site next to the S7 junction with the S8 expressway just a few kilometres from Warsaw's Chopin Airport. City Logistics Warsaw Airport II will have an area of 9,000 sqm and construction work is to begin in August.

Private investment company Cimex Group has appointed Savills as property and leasing manager for its portfolio of twelve properties – ten in Prague, one in Plzen and one in Karlovy Vary – in the Czech Republic, starting August 2020. The total floor area of the buildings is more than 100,000 sqm and the portfolio currently provides premises for more than 500 tenants.

According to consulting company Walter Herz, the consistently expanding office market of Tri-City has the lowest vacancy rate in Poland currently and the office stock of the Tri-City agglomeration will exceed 1 million sqm after the construction of the ongoing investments is completed.

The Polish industrial market continues its strong momentum. Both take-up and supply reached high levels in H1 2020, say experts of global real estate services firm Cushman & Wakefield, summarising the first half of 2020 on the industrial market in Poland.

CBRE Global Investors, on behalf of its Logistics Venture Fund (LoVe), has acquired Building C of 7R Park Beskid I, a newly developed 15,000 sqm logistics warehouse located in Czechowice-Dziedzice in the Bielsko-Biała region of Poland.  The vendor was 7R.S.A.

The Belgrade city government has invited bids for the sale of the Sava congress centre at a minimum price of€ 27.42 million.

Chinese investment company Fosun has acquired the Floreasca Park office building in northern Bucharest from German investor GLL. The transaction was carried out through Fosun’s local subsidiary Resolution Property, which acts as a value-added real estate investment manager.