The lockdown period and the uncertainty of the economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic pushed some tenants to temporarily withhold their decisions in pending lease negotiations. Gross take-up climbed to 334,800 sqm in H1 2020, representing a 17% decrease on the same period in 2019, with most transactions having been commenced in the pre-pandemic environment. Cushman & Wakefield summarised H1 2020 on the Warsaw office market.

Panattoni and Marvipol have sold two city logistics parks in Warsaw to LaSalle Investment Management. The facilities, totalling nearly 25,000 sqm, were sold for approx. €30 million.

The H1 data indicate that the worst-case scenarios regarding the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the Warsaw office market did not materialize. According to a report published by Cresa Poland, the second quarter witnessed a substantial volume of new supply which has now been almost fully absorbed by the market. A total of 100,000 sqm was delivered in Warsaw with an additional 700,000 sqm currently under construction.

Total office market demand reached 335,000 sqm in H1 2020 on the Warsaw office market. In fact, demand for office space in Q2 was significantly higher than in Q1. Vacancy rates across Warsaw increased slightly by 0.1 p.p., with 770,000 sqm under construction. JLL summarised the Warsaw office market in H1 2020.

In the first half of 2020, Globalworth leased nearly 50,000 sqm of office space in its buildings in Poland. In the last 3 months, during very difficult time of the COVID-19 pandemic, the asset management & leasing department of the CEE office investor has signed contracts for a total area exceeding 28,000 sqm.

What will the Warsaw office market look like in the next 18 months? Experts of Savills have outlined two potential scenarios. Both scenarios foresee a short-term decrease in demand and rising vacancy rates, but with a different scale of impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the Polish capital’s office market. Both also forecast that the market will remain resilient in the long term.

Pandemic-related economic and social restrictions have given rise to multiple questions on the office market. Will the demand for office space remain unabated? Will office projects underway be delivered on time? Cresa has reviewed pre-let levels and the progress of office projects currently under construction in Warsaw.

Arrow Capital Partners, an investor and operator of real estate in Europe and Asia-Pacific, has acquired the prime urban logistics asset, Airport House, in Warsaw, for its $3 billion European Strategic Industrial Real Estate (SIRE) platform. The asset has been sold by M7 Real Estate, on behalf of PVBRI, a work-out investment vehicle created by M7 and a Polish Bank to stabilise and turnaround a financially challenged portfolio of industrial, office and retail investments.

The PZU Group has leased 47,000 sqm of office, retail, service and warehouse space, as well as 325 parking spaces in Generation Park Y – Skanska’s highest office building in CEE located in Warsaw. With this lease, the building is now 98.5 percent occupied. The PZU Group will move its headquarters to the new office in Q2 2022. This is the largest lease agreement in the history of the office market in Poland and the history of the Skanska Group in the world.

Panattoni has completed the development of the largest warehouse facility in the Warsaw region – A2 Warsaw Park. The building, totalling close to 104,000 sqm, was delivered in Adamów, right next to the Grodzisk Mazowiecki junction on the A2 motorway. Nearly half of the space provided by the developer has been taken up.