PL

Edition 6 (170) June 2012

Editorial

Gold and green medals

This is my last chance to mention something about Euro 2012. Five years have gone by since the UEFA announcement that Poland and Ukraine had been chosen to be the co-hosts of the tournament.

Ewa Andrzejewska
Office & mixed-use development

A park in the truest sense

POLAND The Castle, the Golden Lane, Charles Bridge... oh, Prague. Its charm, its monuments and - by some considered the best in the world - its Czech beer are appreciated by millions of tourists every year.

Ewa Andrzejewska
Investment & finance

Peaking at the right time

POLAND/HUNGARY By the end of June, Peakside Capital is expecting to have received approval for its recent acquisition of Allied Irish Banks' Polish property fund management subsidiary AIB PPM through its Peakside Real Estate Fund I, as well as for a separate deal, which is part of a 50:50 joint venture with Swiss-based Partners Group, to buy AIB's 9.87 pct interest in Polonia Property Fund LP and its 7.5 pct interest in Polonia Property Fund II. The transactions are still subject to conditions precedent, primarily the approval of investors and competition clearance.

Nathan North
Investment & finance

S+B Gruppe: focused on Central Europe

CEE REGION Austrian development company S+B Gruppe is firmly focused on projects in Central and Eastern Europe. The developer is now about to finish two significant projects in Prague and Bratislava and is preparing a hotel project in the centre of Warsaw.

Radek Górecki
Retail & leisure

Good men in a crisis

CEE REGION The global financial crisis is expected to drag on for a few more years, but there are still opportunities to develop a few projects in the meantime. According to the investment plans of Caelum Development and Futureal, the best conditions in the CEE region are to be found in Poland.

Hotels

Turning green wellies into hard cash

POLAND Agro brand hotels are a new concept designed to tap into the latent potential of rural Polish areas, by encouraging local entrepreneurs to create facilities for the kind of tourists who enjoy self-catering holidays in the countryside. "Our idea is to encourage investors from rural areas to adapt farms in villages or towns that are attractive for tourists," declares Krzysztof Milski, the president of the Polish Chamber of Hoteliers. This self-governing professional organisation has drawn up a development programme for rural areas and towns of up to 5,000 inhabitants, called the European Agro Hotel Organisation. Agro hotels offer entrepreneurs the chance to join the franchise programme of the Polish Chamber of Hoteliers. The organisation is also inviting tourist organisations and local authorities to cooperate.

Aneta Cichla
Stock market report

Builders score an own- goal

The ongoing Greek tragedy has been dragging down bourses across the world for two years now. Nor have the stock exchanges been immune to the recent inability of the country to form a coalition government. But The weakening confidence of investors is also due to the slowdown in the European economy as a whole

(Mir)
Feature

Green savings? but not for developers

If the decision was left to accountants, green buildings would probably never be developed. However, the main advantages apart from the financial gains include the creation of a friendly working environment and a heightened interest in the environment, as was emphasised the experts brought together by ?Eurobuild Central & Eastern Europe' to discuss the issue

Aneta Cichla
Investment & finance

Yielding useful information

"Once you know the yield, then you know everything!" Hardly. There are several kinds of yields, and it is worth familiarising yourself with them to understand what an analyst or an appraiser really has in mind

Anna Pakulniewicz
Office & mixed-use development

Outsourcing mecca

This year the number of employees in the Polish business services sector is to increase from 80,000 to 100,000. This should translate into demand for an additional 200,000 sqm of new office space - but developers need to recognise the specific needs of such potential tenants

Aneta Cichla, Anna Pakulniewicz
Residential

Agents of change

"Real estate agencies sell apartments from the secondary market, but in order to buy a new one you have to visit the sales department of the developer." These days, however, this is far from the full picture

Zuzanna Wiak
Residential

OTP Group sets up Hungarian agency

In Poland real estate agencies are employing ex-bankers, but in Hungary the banks are moving into property, or at least one is. Hungary's biggest bank, OTP Bank, was established in Hungary in 1949. It became a public company in 1990 and was finally privatised in 1995.

Alex Hayes
Events

The head not the heart

Ego or profit? in a health resort or a city? big or small? independent or part of a chain? luxury or economy? boring or sexy?... these are the questions that need to be answered before venturing into the hospitality sector. And the worst thing you can do when investing in hotels is to be ruled by your emotions

Zuzanna Wiak
Endpiece

Square of shame

Standing next to the Palace of Culture and Science in the heart of Warsaw it would be easy to believe that this place is accursed. The only solutions to have taken root under the Stalinist behemoth have been of the tackiest variety: a theme park, a bazaar and shabby supermarkets. The latest scheme to be added to this ignoble litany of ways to use (or misuse) the space is a fan area for Euro 2012

Radosław Górecki

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