Cain International, a privately held real estate investment firm operating in Europe and the United States, and its local development partner, White Star Real Estate, have started construction on PZO, an 18,000 sqm mixed-use scheme in Warsaw’s Praga district on the site of the former Polskie Zakłady Optyki factory.

CBRE announced the appointment of Clare Sheils as Managing Director of CBRE in the Czech Republic effective 15th March 2020. Clare Sheils succeeds the current Managing Director, Richard Curran, who – after a highly successful career spanning 16 years – has decided to leave the business and pursue other interests and career challenges.

Colliers International Poland has published the results of the Office Agency in the Landlord Representation division. In 2019, Colliers advisors rented a total of over 118,000 sqm of office space. This result is nearly 40% higher than in 2018 (88,106 sqm) and 260% higher compared to 2017 (32,824 sqm).

HB Reavis has secured a €162 million loan from a consortium of four banks – Santander Bank Polska, Bank Pekao S.A., PKO Bank Polski S.A. and BNP Paribas Bank Polska S.A. – for the construction of its 78,000 sqm Forrest office campus in Warsaw.  

Demand for alternative residential investments, mainly student housing and residential-for-rent, is clearly growing in Central & Eastern Europe with countries like Poland offering great opportunities for developers. More than 130 real estate professionals came together at the first-ever Alternative Investment Forum, organized by CEE event and intelligence hub Property Forum, in Warsaw.

The stock of industrial and logistics space on the Romanian market has exceeded the 4 million sqm threshold, 90% of the total stock being concentrated in eight large cities from the southern, central and western parts of Romania, according to a new report by the Cushman & Wakefield Echinox.

Prologis has appointed Paweł Sapek as Regional Head Central Europe, a role in which he is responsible for maintaining strong team leadership, identifying new opportunities and steering the region towards new paths of development. Sapek is now responsible for overseeing the company's entire CE portfolio across Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary, with a total area of 4.2 million square meters. In addition, he will run the Polish branch of Prologis and directly supervise operations in Hungary.

Garbe Industrial Real Estate GmbH, one of the leading specialists for logistics and industrial properties in Germany and other countries in Europe, is expanding its footprint in Central Eastern Europe. Martin Polák, a former managing director at Prologis, will join Garbe as Managing Director CEE and will be in charge of the further expansion in the region.

Marvipol Development special purpose vehicles have concluded two preliminary property sale agreements with LaSalle Investment Management KVG. The initial sale price is approx. €29.6 million net.

Carpinus Holding GmbH has acquired a total of 12,000,000 shares in Immofinanz, corresponding to a shareholding of approximately 10.71%. The indirect shareholders of Carpinus Holding GmbH are Peter Korbacka and RPR Privatstiftung (Ronny Pecik).