Instead of attracting new players, the local real estate market is about to lose another major western European investor, Dutch group Redevco, with a portfolio of EUR7.4 billion, which after five years in Romania is preparing its exit.
Redevco has 700 properties at European level, covering a commercial area of around 5 million square meters, in countries such as Austria, Belgium, France and Germany, as well as in Turkey, Hungary and Poland. The group entered the Romanian market in 2007, partnered with French-held EMCT, together with which it announced investments of half a million euros in Romania.
The Dutch group believed back then that the market was “heating up” and anticipated the first failures of shopping centers, but said Redevco was willing to wait “even five years” for the first acquisitions.
Bad timing
Redevco bought a 5.8-ha plot in Tulcea, where the Dutch group announced it would develop a mall with a lettable area of 45,000 square meters in September 2008. Redevco’s plan was made public the same month as the announcement of the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers, now a reference point for the current financial crisis.
The construction of the project was never started and in less than a year the Dutch group cancelled the partnership with EMCT, a company that has developed, among others, the Sun Plaza mall in southern Bucharest.
Given the difficult market conditions, the Dutch group’s activity in Romania was put “on hold” and the plot in Tulcea has recently been put up for sale through consultancy Cushman & Wakefield.
(English version by Daniela Stoican)