The real estate consulting company CBRE Romania assisted the "boutique" investment fund Adventum, led by a Hungarian team and headquartered in Malta, in taking over the Hermes Business Campus offices in the capital from the Belgian developer Atenor. This is the biggest deal signed this year on the Romanian office market.

Based on this business, and on another deal they advised - the sale of Campus 6.2 and 6.3 office project - earlier this year, CBRE expressed buoyant expectations for the office segment of the real estate market.

Campus 6.1, 6.2 and 6.3 offices in the Politehnica area (western Bucharest) were sold by Swedish developer Skanska to CA Immo (6.1) and S Immo (6.2 & 6.3).

"[The deals] mark the return of a trend in the office market: the trading of large projects, which include several buildings. This is a natural response to the high demand that we have seen since 2016 when there was a constant flow of new tenants launching businesses in Romania," explains Mihai Pătrulescu, Head of Investment Properties, CBRE Romania.

Still, the developers have significantly reduced, by 60% to 115,000 sqm, the volume of office deliveries planned for 2022, according to the "Bucharest office market snapshot" report, published by real estate consulting firm Avison Young.

What CBRE reports as a new trend of large-sized deals seems to be a change in office ownership from pre-crisis owners expecting higher yields to new owners with lower expectations.

This indeed creates significant activity for the real estate consultancy firms and a large volume of deals on the (secondary) market, despite the shrinking volume of new spaces delivered on the primary market.

(Photo courtesy of Atenor)

andrei@romania-insider.com