Statistics and conclusions from numerous analyses of Polish commercial property cannot be wrong. Clearly, over the last decade, we have witnessed a huge transformation of the sector in Poland, creating a mature market which offers competitive investment products, both in all standard sectors (office, warehouse, retail and hotel) and alternative investments such as student residential or apartments for rent. The extraordinary success of the market is illustrated by the commercial property investment figure for 2018, with the value of transactions reaching a record high of €7.2bn.
The boom isn’t letting up. The first quarter of 2019 indicates continued strong interest in investing in Poland. What is more, our practice and market data show the group of active investors has grown since last year. On the one hand this creates competition among investors, but on the other hand it motivates developers to come up with new products. Developer activity is also driven by strong demand, which reached record highs in the office sector in the first two quarters of 2019 (more than 400,000 sqm of office space were leased). Due to limited availability of product and a small amount of vacant office space, this demand extends also to projects which are still under development. The commercial property market in Poland benefits from the security provided by the growing scale of the market, by its liquidity and also from positive macroeconomic factors – in particular the growing economy. For these reasons, Poland’s commercial property market has every chance of continuing on its path of fast growth in the near future.
One of the conditions that needs to be fulfilled to allow for such development to continue is to foster and maintain a friendly and stable legal environment. Modern legal solutions must be available to activate and support sustainable market growth. However, Poland has still some areas which need to be tackled or resolved in both these cases. Anyone looking at today’s legal environment must acknowledge that there aren’t any particular barriers making it difficult for investors to enter Poland, yet laws and regulations which govern the investment and development process can be complex. This is often an outcome of historical legacy.
