Monika Rajska-Wolińska, Managing Partner at Colliers International in Poland, presents prognosis for the commercial real estate market in 2013.

When it comes to the office sector we forecast that tenants activity will remain on a similar level as last year, namely 900,000 sqm. The supply of modern office space will grow significantly by 40%, both in Warsaw and in regional cities. Hence, we can observe growing amount of vacant space which may result in decrease of rental rates.

When it comes to industrial market, still the most attractive for investors will be Silesia, Wroclaw, Warsaw and Poznan. Pre-let agreements and BTS warehouses will be the most popular. We do not expect any speculative warehouse projects to appear in 2013. Vacancy rate will record downward trends. Rental rates will remain unchanged in comparison with last year. However, slight increase might be noted in regions where the vacancy rate is significantly lower than 10%.

Retail market in Poland is relatively saturated. It is a tenant market. 750,000 m2 is currently under construction and according to the prognosis 550,000 m2 of new space will be delivered to the market in 2013. Vacancy rate in main Polish agglomerations will remain below 5%.  The lowest vacancy rate is recorded in Szczecin and Warsaw. Polish market is still attractive to international brands. Popular American company Abercrombie & Fitch will enter the Polish market this year.

The forecasts for the investment market are favourable as well. We expect that commercial real estate of the best quality will still be the most attractive assets on the Polish market for both institutional clients and financing institutions. Year 2013 will be less fortunate for real estate of a worse quality due to its low liquidity and only slight interest among investors.  It is closely connected with the difficulty in getting debt financing and meeting financial expectations of the vendors. We forecast that the transaction volume in 2013 will reach similar level as last year around 2,0 - 2,5 billion Euro.