News For Bulgarian Estates and Property Market

09
Apr. 2008 Residential complex for 200 M BGN to be built in Sofia 200 M BGN will be invested in the building of a new residential complex in Sofi (the Bulgarian capital, called Winslow Gardens.

Winslow Developments, a Sofia-based company with Bulgarian and UK shareholders will be the investor, and its partner RREEF, a subsidiary of Deutsche Asset Management owned by Deutsche Bank.

The complex will be situated in the Manastriski Livadi ("Monastery Meadows") Quarter in the southern part of Sofia, close to the Vitosha Mountain. It will include 437 apartments, a park, spa, swimming pool, and other sports facilities. Over 60% of the apartments have already been sold.

The first phase of the project, which must be completed by the middle of 2010, will be funded with a BGN 72 M from the Austrian-owned Reiffeisen Bank granted for a period of 42 months.

The construction works will be performed by the Glavbolgarstroi company.

07
Apr. 2008 FCC to build a temporary port off Vidin Spanish developer FCC plans to build a temporary port off the town of Vidin, Dnevnik daily informed on April 7. FCC has already filed a request for a building permit and has the support of the regional governor of Vidin - Krustio Spassov.
As previously reported by The Sofia Echo, the Spanish developer was contracted to build the second bridge between Romania and Bulgaria over the Danube River.
In a first display of support, Spassov sent a letter backing the FCC undertaking to Bulgarian Regional Development and Public Works Minister Assen Gagaouzov and Bulgarian Transport Minister Petar Moutafchiev.
The port, to be built on public property, will facilitate the transportation of ready-made steel-concrete elements from the production premises in the town's duty-free zone to the construction site.
Currently, the entire production site is in an accelerated design phase.

05
Apr. 2008 Sofia retails up 24 % Retail space rentals in Sofia rose by 24 per cent last year. Rent prices in the capital fluctuated between 40 and 130 euro a sq m in 2007 and rents in shopping centres – between 30 and 60 euro, according to the market survey.
Average rent prices in Plovdiv varied from 30 to 80 euro a sq m and in Varna – from 20 to 90 euro. Rents in Bourgas ranged from 25 to 55 euro a sq m and in Rousse – between 8 and 30 euro.
Commercial sector marked dynamic growth last year, attracting large international investors, as well as local funds. Currently, there is a shortage of retail areas on the market, because the number of completed and working projects in large cities is not big, the authors of the report said.
This is about to change in the forthcoming years, because there is a significant pipeline of projects in Varna, Plovdiv, Bourgas and Rousse. Once finished, they will deliver a huge retail stock to the market, which will change the supply/demand ratio.
Varna already has one mall and another one will start in the upcoming months. Rousse has four projects and there are two mall projects, which are about to start in Bourgas.
There were virtually no sales of commercial units in high retail streets in big cities last year. Few transactions were registered for the sale of small shops (20-30 sq m in area) with prices soaring to 10 000-15 000 euro a sq m. Rent prices in retail streets last year went down slightly, according to the report.
There was practically no interest in shops in secondary locations in less attractive neighbourhoods due to the heated competition of large supermarket chains, which upstaged them. These small retail units are usually revamped into offices or dwellings, whenever possible.
Average sale prices of retail space in Sofia came to 4 000 euro a sq m, in Varna it was at about 3 750 euro a sq m, in Plovdiv – 3 500 euro, in Bourgas – 2 750 euro and in Rousse – 1 440 euro a sq m.

03
Apr. 2008 Bulgarian property prices in Sofia up 10 -17% Prices for diverse types of real estate property in Bulgaria's capital Sofia registered an average increase between 10% and 17% since the beginning of the year, a Bulgarian economic think-tank reported.

The growth in prices can be attributed to the brisk demand by well-off people and insufficient supply, Lachezar Bogdanov from Industry Watch said.

Property prices in the capital are expected to continue their upward march and their annual growth by the end of the year is forecast to range between 10% and 20%.

According to Bogdanov, investors' interest is high in developments in the big cities, particularly in the capital Sofia and the Black Sea town of Varna, which register the highest residential property prices.

The average price paid for residential properties across Bulgaria stood at EUR 737/m2 in 2007 compared to EUR 624/m2 in 2006, according to data of Address real estate company.

Capital Sofia, which boasts the highest salaries in the country, benefited from the real estate boom and recorded the highest rise in prices last year - 25%, reaching an average price of EUR 835/m2.

30
Mar. 2008 Burgas welcomes First Batch of Tourist for 2008 The airport in the Black sea city of Burgas expects to welcome on Sunday with an official ceremony the first group of foreign tourists for the new season aboard a low-cost Sterling airlines plane.

The passengers will take off from the airport in Copenhagen and after landing in Burgas will be transported to the Sunny Beach resort.

The airports in Bulgaria's Black Sea cities of Varna and Burgas processed more than 3,4 million passengers last year, shows data of German firm Fraport, who owns a 35-year concession for the two airports.

The Burgas airport processed a record-high 1,95 million passengers, a 7,3 % increase compared to 2006, while Varna's 1,5 million passengers meant a 2,6% drop over last year.

Fraport's two Bulgarian international airports accounted for 4,4% of its total 75,6 million passengers processed by the company last year, with the Frankfurt international airport alone serving 54,1 million.

Fraport and Bulgarian firm BM Star won the 35 years concession in 2006, pledging to invest EUR 403 M in new terminals, expansion and equipment over that period.