The value of real-estate transaction on the Romania market in the first three months of this year amounts to around 450 mil euro, which amounts to more than half of last year’s total figure which stood at 740 mil euro, Nine o' Clock reports.

The total amount was calculated taking into consideration both purchase prices mostly revealed by concerned parties and estimates from market sources, according to Mediafax calculations.

So far, this year’s most important transaction was the acquisition of the Polus Constanta commercial facility by the Austrian fund Immoeast, which announced it would pay Trigranit Holding 185 mil euro, through a 'forward purchase' type of contract, extending on several phases. Immoeast will purchase this project gradually, depending on execution stages and occupancy rate.

In fact, the Austrian fund has been the most active investor this year, having been involved in four out of the ten transactions concluded this year.

Two other projects purchased by Immoeast are business parks S-Park and Victoria Park in Bucharest. S-Park, built in the vicinity of the Press Square by Primavera Development, was purchased for approximately 90 mil euro, with a productivity figure of 6.9 per cent. For Victoria Park, built by the Belgian company Liebrecht & wooD near Baneasa airport, Immoeast agreed on a EUR 60 M price.

Immoeast also invested EUR 60 M purchasing 25 per cent shares in the Adama Holding Public real-estate development group, which envisages Romanian investments estimated at EUR 600 M. Adama’s shareholders are American company Tiger Global Management, private investment trust American RomRe, management and founding members.

The hotel market has also witnessed two business deals this year. Israeli company Atlas Estates took over the Golden Tulip hotel, located on Bucharest’s Victoriei Ave., for EUR 20 M, while Metis Capital, also from Israel, purchased the Capital’s Cerna hotel, as part of its Finit Investment & Development takeover, for EUR 2.6 M.

A single transaction was recorded in the industrial properties market. German transport company Transalkim sold for EUR 3.95 M to the Eastern European Property Fund investment fund a real-estate project comprising storage and office areas situated near Bucharest.

In their latest market study, CB Richard Ellis’ analysts estimated that this year Romania will remain one of the most appealing markets in Central and Eastern Europe, both for institutions and private companies seeking to invest.

In their opinion, the market will register an increase in number of unfinished projects transactions, to the detriment of finalized projects, investors thus wanting to ensure optimum yield to lessen the impact of continual prices increase. The company Alia Immobiliaria, a subsidiary of Spanish group Alius, will enter the Romanian real estate market with a nearly EUR 35 M investment in a residential compound consisting of 130 luxury apartments in Bucharest’s Arcul de Triumf area.

“The compound will be erected on the Maresal Averescu Boulevard and will consist of three buildings, of six, eight and 20-storeys high, to a total of 130 apartments,” the Alius Group general manager, Fernando Moreno, said. The compound will be developed on a surface area 5,000 square meters, the built surface being of nearly 18,000 sq m.

“They are one, two, three and four-bedroom apartments, with surfaces between 65 and 250 sq m,” Moreno said, adding that the apartments are built with high-income customers in mind, with prices yet to be established given negotiations with suppliers and construction companies are underway.

The funding comes from Alius’s own pocked and from a EUR 26 M HVB Tiriac Bank loan. Works began last January and the project is slated for completion in March of 2009.