“We are not considering it now, but if we got a good price, we might sell Sun Plaza. Never say never,” Wachernig says.
Sun Plaza opened in 2010 and sales went up 17.7% in 2016 compared with 2015. At a yearly sales average of EUR170 million, as the company said it had in 2014, the mall must have posted EUR200 million to EUR240 million sales last year, according to ZF’s calculations.
Sun Plaza in southern Bucharest is undergoing a EUR30 million revamp, which will add 40 new stores.
One of the biggest deals with shopping centers in Bucharest was the sale by Raiffeisen of the Promenada mall in northern Bucharest to South Africa’s NEPI for EUR148 million in 2014.
S Immo has also made progress with The Mark office project it is building near Piata Victoriei in downtown Bucharest, but has yet to sign a lease with a tenant. The Mark will be delivered in the second quarter of 2018.
The developer is in talks with several IT and services companies looking to rent space in what is known as the CBD – Central Business District. It hopes to reach 75% rental before delivery and prefers to wait to sign leases for higher rents, Friedrich Wachernig.
Average rent in CBD is about EUR18.5 per square meter, one of the highest in Bucharest, considering rents in the north of the city range from EUR13 to EUR16 per square meter. The Mark is the only office space project under development in Piata Victoriei, and might be joined by a project developed by the Tiriac group real estate division in 2019.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)