An expanding BPO/SSC sector does not just boost the economy but the construction market as well. Investment funds and real estate agencies point out that in CEE there is still a need for prime offices, shopping centers and logistics infrastructure. Skanska, JLL and Dentons, in cooperation with ABSL have published their latest CEE Investment Report 2016: Mission to Outperform.

The latest Colliers report reveals a stable retail property market in Bulgaria during the first half of 2016. Modern shopping centers in Sofia retained the absorption levels from the previous period – nearly 15,000 sqm of leasable space, compared to 16,370 sqm in the second half of 2015. In well-established projects enjoying active demand, this equals to an average share of 4% from the GLA. 

Vacancy rates reached a record low level on the Budapest office market as a result of modest development activity and strong demand from tenants. The Budapest Research Forum has published its quarterly office market analysis.

Commercial real estate investment remained strong across Europe in Q2 2016 totaling €54.0 billion, up 2.5 per cent on Q1 2016 and 30.4 per cent on the ten year average. Investment into CEE countries for H1 2016 registered a substantial increase (59%) compared to same period of last year, reaching almost €5 billion. Expectations are that for the entire year, investment volumes will reach and exceed the record volumes of 2015, with all CEE countries expected to perform strongly.

Renewals dominated the Budapest industrial property market in the second three months of the year where the vacancy rate has increased for the first time in nearly three years. The Budapest Research Forum has published its Q2 2016 industrial market snapshot.  

Cushman & Wakefield has published its new CE industrial map to give a comprehensive overview of the most important logistics and industrial sites in Central Europe, Russia and Germany. In addition, this year’s edition has been expanded with figures for Italy’s Milan.

“Total commercial real estate investment in the Czech Republic recorded €490m in Q2 2016 contributing to an H1 2016 total of €950 million, a 26% reduction on the same period of last year. However, it should be noted that the considerable difference is due to the Palladium shopping centre transaction in H1 2015. When excluded, H1 2016 was 34% up on H1 2015,” says Jiri Horak, investment analyst at JLL.     

The sharp rebound of the Hungarian real estate investment market witnessed in H2 2015 has gained further momentum during the first half of this year. According to JLL the transaction volume of the first semester reached more than EUR 910 million, already more than during the full 2015 year, highlighting the increasing weight of capital targeting Hungarian assets.

Last year has proven to be a turning point for the Romanian investment market. An increased number and more diverse group of investors started looking at individual assets and portfolios, resulting in the largest number of transactions since the beginning of the crisis. Will this upward trend continue into 2016 and 2017? We report from SEE Property Forum 2016, a conference co-organised by Portfolio Conferences and RICS, where the biggest players of the Romanian investment market came together to talk about the future. 

The total modern office stock in Warsaw reached 4.75 million sqm at the end of Q1 2016. As much as ca. 75% of this space is located in the central Core and Fringe zones, as well as Upper South and South West. Cushman & Wakefield has published the sixth edition of their Skyline Tracker report, outlining developers’ activity in the Warsaw office market.