Christopher Mertlitz, Managing Director, Head of European Investments at W. P. Carey, talked to Property Forum about the environment for property transactions in 2023 and the company’s focus on mission-critical projects in its portfolio.

Marius Persenea, COO of Romanian developer Iulius, spoke with Property Forum about the macroeconomic picture of the country going into 2023 and the potential of regional cities to attract property investments on the medium and long term.

In Q1-Q3 2022, CA Immo was able to increase its recurring earnings (FFO I) by 2.4% year-on-year to €102.5 million in the third quarter. Rental income rose by 2.5% to €158.1 million in the first nine months. The recent portfolio expansions and higher rental income from investment properties thus more than offset the effects from portfolio sales. Consolidated net income rose by 40% to €267.5 million, driven among other things by a strong revaluation result (Q1-Q3 2021: €180.4 million). The positive development in the third quarter was mainly due to the good letting business and the takeover of two project completions into the own portfolio. Following the strong first nine months, CA Immo confirms its earnings forecast for 2022 and expects recurring earnings (FFO I) of more than €125 million.

In the first three quarters of 2022, Immofinanz’s rental income reached a high €216.9 million, the results of asset management improved by 3.2% to €168.4 million, and sustainable FFO 1 from the standing investment business (including the S Immo dividend) rose by more than 15% to €115.9 million. Net profit equalled €248.6 million.

Immofinanz has received approval from its Supervisory Board to enter into negotiations with its core shareholder CPI Property Group concerning the acquisition of shares in S Immo. Currently, Immofinanz directly holds approx. 26.49% of S Immo. CPIPG directly holds 52.7% of S Immo, which may further increase as a result of CPIPG’s mandatory takeover offer over S Immo.

Rent indexation shall provide for further FFO increase, while low interest cost and improved maturity profile offer downside protection, says GTC. 

Due to strong Q1 activity, partially spilling over from last year, investment volumes for the first three quarters of 2022 totalled €7.5 billion. Year-end 2022 volumes could reach between €9.0 and 10.0 billion, reveals a report by Colliers.

Industrial and logistics developer CTP recorded strong like-for-like rental growth of 4.3% in the first nine months of 2022, while net rental income rose 36.8% to €328.2 million by the end of September compared to the same period of last year. 

Immofinanz has successfully completed the sale of additional office properties. Two office buildings in Vienna were sold to the Austrian Winegg Group for an attractive market price of approximately €60 million. These two properties have 7,000 sqm of space in total and are occupied by long-term tenants.

We can see more interest coming from government entities to rent office space in modern office buildings in CEE. We also see large companies centralising their office spaces in a single building. Property Forum asked Tomasz Lisiecki, CEO of TriGranit about his assessment of these trends.