VGP has announced the establishment of a new 50:50 Joint Venture named “Saga” with Areim, an independent fund manager and property owner headquartered in Stockholm. The Saga Joint Venture will focus exclusively on key European markets, including France, Germany, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Hungary.

With the upcoming introduction of mandatory non-financial reporting, which will require companies to report on how they are performing in the areas of environment, employee relations and responsibility, and ethical working practices, industrial and logistics companies are taking a keener interest in sustainable solutions. This interest is then reflected in their demands for the properties on which they are based. Research by Colliers shows that the sustainability issue has so far been most commonly addressed by large multinationals, who expect properties to be equipped with sustainable technologies such as heat pumps, heat recovery units, energy-efficient smart lighting and photovoltaics. Experts from Colliers predict that interest in this topic will also increase next year but among smaller local companies. 

Marek Blaha, Head of affordable housing developer Dostupné bydlení České spořitelny, talked to Property Forum about the necessity of expanding the overall availability of housing in the Czech Republic. According to him, one of the strategies to solve such a problem could lie in augmenting the proportion of rental housing and this could be supported by the cooperation of banks, municipalities and developers.

Českomoravská nemovitostní has acquired a quarter stake in the Churchill Square office complex in Prague near the main railway station for CZK 1 billion (€41 million). It has thus become the majority owner of the complex. The seller was a holding from Lebanon, reports the daily e15.cz.

It is anticipated that the market will experience the transition from being perceived as a problem to an opportunity for many investors and funds in 2024. CBRE summarised this year's developments in the Czech commercial real estate market and provided an outlook for 2024. 

Logistics developer CTP has built a new coworking centre named "Clubco' in the IQ Ostrava complex on Náměstí Republiky where the company Tietoevry was previously located. The premises are suitable for small and medium-sized companies, as well as corporations or freelancers. Up to 130 people can work together in 1,512 sqm of office space.

In 2024, PSN will begin a two-year reconstruction of the famous functionalist building in the centre of Pardubice. The first republican Grand Hotel, which served as a shopping centre for over 20 years, will now be transformed into a modern shopping centre with full preservation of the original legacy of the architect Gočár. The renovation is expected to cost €12.331 million, PSN estimates.

According to Savills, about half (51%) of European investors plan to invest in co-living developments in the next three years, and, compared to 2022, co-living projects are where investor interest has grown the most. Market players, including Lithuania-based investor Baltic Asset Management, see big potential for projects of this type in the Czech market as well. The company’s CFO, Dalius Kaveckas, shared his insights with Property Forum.

Savills has negotiated a pre-lease of warehouse space for Flosman, a Czech company engaged in the retail and wholesale of food and pharmaceuticals. The lease covers 8,000 sqm of warehouse and almost 600 sqm of office space in the CSPPark Planá NL project (in Southern Bohemia). The hall is planned to be operational in the third quarter of 2024. 

ČEZ Esco and CTP have launched a strategic cooperation in the field of modern energy and renewable energy. They intend to equip the roofs of selected CTP parks with photovoltaic power plants in the coming years. The first joint photovoltaic plant with a capacity of 2 MW has already been built in CTPark Prague East in Nupaki near Prague on the roofs of the halls where the logistics company Raben is located. A test run of this rooftop PV system is currently underway. New power plants are also being built at CTParks in Chrášt'any near Prague, Hradec Králové, Brno, Ostrava and Cerhovice near Hořovice. The companies are considering extending their cooperation to other areas of modern energy.