Strong H1 for real estate investment market in Poland

• 2.9 billion EUR transacted is the second-best H1 in history.
• Pandemic quarter better than expected with 710 million EUR in offices alone.
• The industrial sector comes in with its best ever H1 result.

“According to preliminary estimates, the value of investment transactions in the first half of the year totalled nearly 2.9 billion EUR - the second-best result in the history of Poland’s real estate sector. Despite the global pandemic, the first six months of the year saw a continuation of trends that have been observed on the market for some time now. Industrial and office investors are very much to the fore. In fact, the industrial sector, which had its best H1 in history, may see challenges connected with product availability”, says Agata Sekuła, Vice-President, JLL Poland.

In the first half of 2020, 21 office investment transactions involving 38 buildings were concluded, with the top three being the sale by Skanska High Five 4&5 to Credit Suisse (Kraków), Wola Center by Develia to Hines (Warsaw), and Equal Business Park by Cavatina to Apollo Rida (Kraków). The above result was very much due to the acquisition of a majority stake in GTC by the Hungarian Optimum Ventures Private Equity Fund, which in Poland has a portfolio of both office buildings and shopping centres. In the industrial sector, 14 investment transactions involving 40 buildings were finalized, with the largest being the sale of Panattoni's portfolio of five facilities to Savills Investment Management, Hines distribution parks sold to CGL, and the sale of Maximus portfolio - six properties managed by Apollo - to GIC.

“The second quarter was marked by high investor activity on the office market. Ten contracts for the sale of 27 buildings with a total value of approx. 710 million EUR were finalised in the last three months. As a result, the value of the office investment transactions outpaced the industrial sector, totalling more than 1.3 billion EUR in H1”, explains Tomasz Puch, Head of Office and Industrial Investment, JLL.

”The lockdown made it very difficult to commence new transactions, because travelling, property visits and technical inspections were impossible. However, their remaining stages could be successfully carried out virtually. Many of the transactions that were in progress at the beginning of the lockdown have already been finalised or are scheduled for finalisation in the coming weeks and months. Since it is again possible to cross borders, foreign investors are arriving in Warsaw and business is slowly returning in the shape of meetings, inspections and direct negotiations. We expect that the second half of the year will be even more intense”, summarizes Agata Sekuła.