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Bucharest land market hit a new record high în 2016
The Bucharest land market last year hit a new record high, with an aggregate of 110 hectares of land property traded, 144 pct more than in 2015; the money value of the properties was 127 million euro, up 41 pct from the previous year, according to a a survey by a real estate company.
According to the survey, the market was driven primarily by the residential sector, which attracted investors in the northern area of the city, but also by the logistics sector, which keeps on developing at a sped up pace in the west, at the entrance of the Bucharest - Pitesti motorway. Near 90 pct of the land surface traded last year is intended for the development of residential or logistics projects (62.8 pct and 26.4 pct, respectively).
The rekindling of the interest in the residential sector in the north of the capital city follows a long period of lackluster activity, as data centralized by the National Institute of Statistics shows that only 380 new homes were commissioned in Bucharest Sector 1, out of a total of 3,838 homes handed over in Bucharest.
"Apart from an increase in the surface and value of the traded land plots, a significant diversification is noticeable in the buyers' profile. Thus, companies like Strabag Real Estate or Prime Kapital last year performed the first land acquisitions in Bucharest, while groups like Atenor, Hanner or Auchan completed new deals after several years of inactivity. We expect this year the activity of office developers to intensify amid a rather limited number of new projects for the period 2019 - 2020; on the retail segment too, Bucharest has proven that it can absorb new modern spaces, whether we are talking about individual lots, retail parks and even mall projects," said Alexandru Mitrache, Cushman & Wakefield Echinox commercial land development consultant.