Residential sector on rise to comprise 30% of European investment volumes in this cycle

Leading diversified professional services and investment management company, Colliers, has issued a new report European Residential: On the Rise examining the drivers behind mounting investor interest in residential properties in Europe’s major cities. The report ranks major destinations in terms of their allure to investors and highlights the opportunities and risks emerging around an increasingly prominent asset class.

With more and more Europeans seeking to live in renowned business, cultural and educational centers such as London, Paris, and Amsterdam, and rising incomes lifting more families beyond qualifying thresholds for social housing, the underlying supply-demand imbalance in most cities is resulting in house prices rising faster than average incomes. 

Warsaw has long been split between owner-occupied housing and social rentals, but a new generation of younger, wealthier Varsovians is coming to appreciate the flexibility of private rental accommodation. Incomes and housing prices are rising sharply in Warsaw, creating opportunities for pioneering investors eager to enter a city that is rising in importance on the European and global stage.  

“When it comes to the residential sector, Warsaw can be perceived as one of the most important developing cities in Europe. Although currently almost the entire housing stock in Warsaw still consists of owner-occupied and municipal flats, due to the strong economic growth of Warsaw and the social changes taking place in it, the PRS market is clearly expanding, and the number of foreign investors interested in this segment is growing,” Dorota Wysokińska-Kuzdra, Senior Partner at Colliers, Director of Corporate Finance, commented. 

“Although the European Residential: On the Rise report mainly analyzes the capitals of European countries, it is worth noting that the PRS segment in Poland is concentrated not only in Warsaw. We can observe an equally dynamic development of this sector in Wrocław, Kraków, Gdańsk, Poznań and Łódź,” Dorota Wysokińska-Kuzdra added.

(WBJ)