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STOP.SHOP.s: A new commercial center concept in Romania
The Austrian group Immofinanz wants to bring a network of small size commercial centers, a concept it intended to develop before the beginning of the financial crisis. The development in the Romanian market has in view retail and logistic projects.
“Our activity in Romania focuses on retail and logistic, but we plan to use a few lands from the portfolio for the development of residential projects under the Adama brand, involving only apartments for sale. Under the Log Center brand we want to concentrate on the development of logistic projects in Romania and Russia. In Romania we will soon bring the Stop.Shop.s brand. We have some very interesting land in our portfolio,” said representatives of Immofinanz, one of the most important real estate investors in Romania.
At present Immofinanz evaluates the Stop.Shop.s concept developed in 50 locations in Austria and Eastern Europe for different locations in Austria and Eastern Europe, for different locations in Romania but made no decisions in this respect.
The Austrian company announced in 2007 the intention to develop a network of 20 such commercial centers in Romania, the first locations indicated being Arad and Targu Mures, but the plans stopped because of the financial crisis.
“The Stop.Shop.s concept is ideal for Balkan countries, considering the size of towns and the purchase power of the population. The retailers’ feedback was very good. We will continue to expand the brand in Poland, where we want to open ten medium term units. We have similar projects in Slovenia and the Czech Republic. Besides the Poland expansion we now develop the first Stop.Shop.s in Romania and Serbia,” the Immofinanz representative added.
The Stop.Shop.s business represents 6.7% of the overall portfolio of the group and includes shops situated in localities with 30,000-150,000 potential clients, having an area of 3,000-15,000 square meters on a single level.Immofinanz created the Stop.Shop.s network in 2002.
Immofinanz has 89 properties in Romania (17 investments completed, 11 under completion and 61 projects under analysis) with a value of 978.5 million euro (695.3 million euro- completed investments, 32.5 million euro - developing projects and 286.7 million euro- projects under analysis).
The group has nine office buildings (13.9% of the office building portfolio), five properties in the retail area (10.2% of retail portfolio) and three logistic properties (3.3% of the logistic portfolio).
The Austrian group registered incomes of 47.9 million euro in the financial year 2013/2014, from the rental of the a7 real estate properties in Romania. The drop of incomes was generated by the loss of tenants from office buildings, when the occupation degree of the 206,402 sq.m dropped from 91.1% to 76.8%. This evolution was reflected in the dynamics of incomes from rental of office buildings, which dropped from 23.6 million euro to 21.2 million euro. The most important office buildings held by Immofinanz in Romania are IRIDE Business Park (Pipera), S-Park (Presei Square), Victoria Park (Baneasa) or Bucharest Corporate Center (Buzesti).
The 5 commercial centers totaling 147,000 sq.m lost fewer tenants, reaching an occupation degree of 91.6% compared to 93% a year before, but incomes from rent maintained at 19.5 million euro. The commercial centers are Cluj, Constanta, Pitesti, Baia Mare and Arad (a project in which only Bricostore functions).
Immofinanz holds many residential ensembles, controlled by means of real estate development company Adama.