While net industrial take-up is down compared to 12-18 months ago, we are seeing a large uptick in enquiries across CEE for strategic production spaces across the automotive, pharmaceuticals, and electric vehicle battery production sectors. James Fitzgerald, Director, Head of Industrial Agency at iO Partners Czechia talked to Property Forum about the main drivers of the CEE industrial market.

While international investors remain cautious, local players from CEE remain actively engaged, opportunistically monitoring the market, and taking advantage of reduced competition. Gábor Zeller, Senior Director, Capital Markets at iO Partners Hungary, talked to Property Forum about key investment trends and shared his market expectations for the rest of the year.

Demand for modern industrial space is still considerably high though European manufacturing companies are not taking home their production as quickly as earlier expected. Meanwhile, Asian firms in the automotive industry are increasingly seeking proper warehouses and logistics service providers. Property Forum asked Máté Szoboszlay, Director of Capital Deployment at Prologis Hungary about the change in e-commerce-related demand and the special needs of Asian tenants.

A key to a successful property development is a responsible real estate development strategy which also takes into account accessibility, self-sustainability and biodiversity. Zsolt Hintenberger MRICS, Managing Partner at Realiscon talked to Property Forum about the different aspects of ESG compliance, going deeper than the usual buzzwords.

Jacek Korwin-Małaszyński and Michał Korwin-Małaszyński, Members of the Board of APP Projekt, one of the leaders in construction engineering in Poland, have talked to Property Forum about the current situation on the property market, prices of the materials and the impact of the '2% Safe Credit' on the industry.

Leoš Anderle, CEO of Sekyra Group spoke to Property Forum about the residential projects of the Group not only in Prague but also in other cities, including abroad. He also shared what kind of buildings are the most complicated to build.

James Fife, CEO of LCP Properties Poland has talked to Property Forum about the company`s investment plans, the impact of the high interest rates and the entrance into the warehouse market.

Jiří Oslizlo, Chairman of the Board of Agrop Nova talked to Property Forum about the unique properties of wood and wooden constructions and how he would like to use his life experience from abroad to help reconfigure Czech thinking and ways of building. 

Tomáš Vrbický, Founder of Czech development company Noho, talked to Property Forum about the recent energy crisis's positive impact on the sustainable housing approach. According to him, the crises also helped people to think about “green” housing more deeply and be more willing to pay extra for such living with unique solutions for energy savings as it can enormously reduce energy costs in the future.

Barbara Topolska, Country Manager for Poland at CPI Property Group has talked to Property Forum about the acquisition of Immofinanz, ESG contributions and the current financing conditions.