Romania’s real estate investment market remains small compared to those in neighbouring countries. This is one of the reasons that most of this year’s transactions, amounting to a total of €300 million have been done off-market: Skanska sold its Campus 6.1 office building to CA Immo, Portland Trust and Ares Management sold Oregon Park to Lion Head Investment and Atrium Real Estate sold Militari Shopping Center to MAS Real Estate. “Almost all transactions being carried out via direct negotiations, which is normal, because the market is a rather small and closed one, with the same investors and developers,” Ana Dumitrache, Head of Investment Property at CBRE said at CEDER, the real estate conference organized by Roberts Publishing Media Group. She added that investment volume last year was around €1 billion and consisted of 27 deals (including plots of land), while for the whole of the CEE region the figure was €5.5 billion divided among 109 deals. Speaking about the costs, Dumitrache remarked that finance in Romania is still more expensive than in other comparable CEE countries. One of the reasons is the non-performing loan rate in real estate, which is one of the highest across all industries, at 20%, beaten only by construction (30%).
