Investors and clients in Poland are focusing on local shopping centres, says advisory firm Walter Herz. 

Development company Antracit is launching a series of projects in several cities in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. It is preparing a mixed-use rental project in Ostrava, an office and apartment project and a rental project in Pilsen. A mixed-use rental project is also being prepared in Žilina and another rental project in an industrial area in Prešov, the company announced. 

The year 2021 has recorded over 65,000 sqm of the space in newly completed retail parks. This is the highest growth of the retail space in the Czech Republic in five years. Behind this success, there is mainly the stable interest among shoppers, long-term lease contracts and tenant expansion as also a surge of interest among investors. Nevertheless, the higher costs are now slowing the construction of the new retail parks. Therefore, a boost in the demand for space and likely push up rents as well are expected, states Cushman & Wakefield in their last report.

Bank Pekao S.A. completed the €10 million refinancing project of a retail park portfolio owned by Newbridge Poland. The investor was advised in this process by the Avison Young investment team.

Zacaria Group, the largest developer of logistics spaces in Sibiu, will open next year a retail park in Cisnădie, Sibiu, following an investment of more than €11 million. 

Atrium has sold the shopping mall Optima in Košice, Slovakia. The company wants to focus on its core markets, Warsaw and Prague from now.

Adventum Group’s largest deal to date – a portfolio of 18 retail parks anchored by Tesco across Hungary and the Czech Republic with a GLA of 360,000 sqm let to over 900 tenants – has come to a successful completion and with this transaction Adventum’s assets under management has reached €1 billion.

Austrian real estate group Supernova has added four MAX shopping malls to its portfolio of eleven OBI supermarkets in Slovakia. The transaction, without mentioning the price, was reported by the news website reality.trend.sk.

The retail market in Romania is set to expand by more than 500,000 sqm in the next four years, with 10 of the projects in the pipeline each having more than 10,000 sqm, according to  Cushman & Wakefield Echinox. 

Danny Bercovich was promoted to Regional Director of Retail of GTC. Previously, he has served the company as the CEO of GTC in Bulgaria and Romania. In the new role, Mr Bercovich will steer the company’s operations and growth strategy in the retail segment.