Although nearly 120,000 square meters of new industrial / logistics space was delivered to the Budapest market in 2017 which is almost double of the figure delivered in 2016. It may still occur that by the end of the year the available warehouse units with 5,000 sqm+ space will disappear from the Budapest market and its surrounding area, according to Colliers International's latest industrial property market report.

Retail and hotel sectors recorded highest investment volumes in the Croatian commercial property market in 2017. According to information available and Colliers’s estimate, 2017 brought more than €320 million investment in transactions of 22 investment properties. This does not include pending transactions or confidential deals.

Prologis announced the sale of Prologis Park Hegyeshalom in Hungary to Horvath Rudolf Intertransport Ltd, a Hungarian logistics services provider. The transaction includes a fully leased Class A logistics facility totalling 32,300 square metres and 24 hectares of land. Noerr and JLL represented Prologis while Deloitte advised Horvath Rudolf. 

In 2017, CTP increased its portfolio by approximately 680,000 sqm and reached a record 4.5 million sqm. Occupancy of its industrial real estate — spread across over 82 locations in the region — came to 97.7%. The greatest expansion occurred in the Romanian and Hungarian markets. By 2022, CTP aims to double its portfolio, reaching 10 million sqm.

Prologis announced several promotions at its Czech and Slovak offices. Martin Baláž has been promoted to Vice President of Development and Leasing at Prologis Czech Republic and Slovakia; Václav Krasanovský has been promoted to Vice President of Property Management at Prologis Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary; Martin Stratov moves up to the position of Director of Development and Leasing at Prologis Slovakia. The promotion of Kateřina Březinová to Leasing Manager at Prologis Czech Republic completes this promotion round.

LS Cable, a Korean manufacturing company, has decided to launch its division in Dzierżoniów - in the region of Lower Silesia. The facility will be established within an existing object offering 10,000 sqm. Experts from JLL represented LS Cable in the processes of seeking the appropriate property and negotiating purchase conditions.

Prologis has already fully leased its new 28,300 sqm speculative facility now under construction at Prologis Park Prague-Uzice in the Czech Republic. Construction of Building 3 began in January 2018 and was launched due to high demand for space at the fully occupied park.

Panattoni Europe is to build a courier delivery distribution centre for DHL Parcel Polska. The cross-docking facility will feature close to 9,000 sqm and will be built in Radzymin. Construction works commenced at the beginning of the year and will be finished in October 2018. The lease was signed for 10 years, and the contract was mediated by the international advisory firm CBRE.

The year 2017 saw the greatest amount of industrial space built in Europe in its history – more than 3.7 million sqm. This represents a 68% increase over 2016 and a 55% increase over the existing record dating back to 2007 (an additional 1.2 million sqm). The total industrial space in the region has increased by 17% as a result. Such are the results of a survey conducted by Cushman & Wakefield, a company that has been monitoring the industrial property market in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland, Hungary and Romania on a long-term basis.

As of January 2018, BNP Paribas Real Estate was selected to provide property management services for a real estate portfolio of 60,000 sqm commercial properties owned by OTP Real Estate Investment Fund. The mandate consists of 4 buildings: Akadémia Park, Szépvölgyi 22, Raday 42 and a logistics park in Gyál, at the outskirts of Budapest.