The biggest contract is the pre-rental by Indian-held outsourcing group Genpact of 22,000 square meters in a Hermes Business Campus building in the Dimitrie Pompeiu area in northern Bucharest developed by Belgium’s Athenor. The building where Genpact plans to relocate will be completed next year.
Second biggest was the rental by Oracle of 20,000 square meters in Oregon Park that Portland Trust is building near Aurel Vlaicu subway station. Oracle rented 10,000 square meters in the tallest building in Bucharest, Sky Tower.
“Demand was mostly pre-leases and requests for more than 5,000 square meters. Calea Floreasca-Barbu Vacarescu (in Bucharest i.e.) remained the most popular area followed by Dimitrie Pompeiu,” says Horatiu Popescu, chief executive officer of real estate consultant Knight Frank, which brokered the three largest office space deals in the first nine months.
Rents have been stable and the vacancy rate of Class A office buildings dropped, he added. Rents in Bucharest stand at EUR14-EUR16/square meter in Floreasca-Barbu Vacarescu, and at EUR16 to EUR18/square meter in Piata Victoriei-Charles de Gaulle.
Most transactions this year were signed for office space in Bucharest, which is the most active market in the country with a stock of about 2.2 million square meters. Even so, there were some significant deals in other big cities of the country. India’s Tata Technologies pre-let 3,300 square meters in the second phase of Coresi Business Park in Brasov developed by Ascenta Management on the former Tractorul plant site. Ness Software Engineering Services pre-let 2,800 square meters in one of the office buildings to be part of Openville complex in Timisoara developed by businessman Iulian Dascalu.
“The office space market is reaching maturity and companies are thinking long-term about expansion. In the first half alone 36% of the total deals were pre-leases. We expect the upward trend on the office space market to continue until the end of the year,” says Mihai Paduroiu, head of office agency with real estate consultant CBRE. One of the deals CBRE handled was the relocation of French-held Carrefour to Green Court in northern Bucharest.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)