Daniela Lazea, Partner and Co-Head of Real Estate at Romanian law firm Biriș Goran, spoke to Property Forum about Romania’s potential to become a relocation base for companies in the region and the real estate market’s ability to surpass €1 billion transactions in 2022.

The fears of a recession are likely to cool down the red-hot real estate market in CEE countries, Erste specialists expect. According to them, this will be influenced mainly by surging inflation, the cost of credit and cooling down of the borrowing, and shrinking of the disposable household income which will also worsen the borrowing appetite in the coming periods. There is a change in the respondent’s behaviour too. Whereas respondents from Poland, Hungary and Croatia are open to buying or building a house, Czechs, Slovaks and Slovenians are less inclined to do so, say Erste experts in their recent special report.

Property developer Prime Kapital has delivered four out of five apartment buildings in its first residential project in Bucharest. The company has invested €47.8 million in the project that will feature 458 apartments. 

The third and final stage of the Hron Residence project in Zvolen, Slovakia, is now starting to be built. Arkon, the developer of the €15 million project, has announced the final stage launch on its social media.

Investment group DRFG has started to build a new apartment complex in Mladá Boleslav in Michalovice. As part of the project, called Green, an apartment building with more than a hundred apartments, garages and a large garden with a water reservoir will be built within two years. The market value of the project is CZK 634.6 million (€25.9 million), according to DRFG spokeswoman Monika Brichtová.

Czech investment and development group Trigema has bought a 51% stake in CenovaMapa.org, the market leader in online real estate valuation. Its founder, Hyposervis, retains 49% of the company. Following the acquisition, the parties did not disclose the amount. The newly created real estate data provider has been renamed Dataligence.

The Purpose-Built Student Accommodation (PBSA) sector is recording an increase in rents across Europe, consolidating a trend that has been observed in recent years. On average, rents increased by 9.7% (970 BPS) in the academic year September 2021–September 2022, with some significant spikes in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), according to research by Bonard. The growth of rents is shaped by the interplay between increased demand and rising inflation and interest rates.

Romanian developer One United Properties has increased its share capital by €51.5 million in a bid to fund new residential investments in Bucharest.

The investment volumes in Romanian residential projects reached 4.6 billion lei (€933.5 million) in the first quarter of 2022, which was up 50% compared to the same period of last year, according to a report by real estate consultancy Colliers.

American-owned company Bucharest Properties REIT has started the development of a new block with 55 apartments for rent in the Vitan Estates residential project in Bucharest.