JLL advised industrial and logistic lease agreements totalling almost 100,000 sqm in Q1, for clients such as Profi, NOD, Tibbett Logistics, KLG and Kuehne + Nagel.
The largest lease agreements involved Profi – 30,000 sqm in Roman, in the north-east of Romania and NOD – 30,000 sqm in Bucharest. Hence Belgian developer WDP will deliver 30,000 sqm of new warehouse space in Roman for the retail chain while CTP is currently developing another 30,000 sqm of distribution space close to Bucharest, in CTPark Bucharest West for Network One Distribution (NOD).
Tibbett Logistics is expanding its presence in Romania, with a new warehouse space of 7,200 sqm leased in CTPark Bucharest West and in the same project, KLG rented 9,700 sqm of logistic space. Moreover, the international logistics service provider Kuehne+Nagelwill move into a newly developed distribution centre of about 6,000 sqm in Timisoara, owned by WDP.
”The Industrial market continues to be very dynamic in terms of new supply and demand”, commented Viorel Opaiț, business development director JLL Romania. “The expansion of the retail companies and the strongly increasing consumption are the main drivers of the sector. We are honoured to continue our partnership with Profi, which we previously represented in another transaction of 30,000 sqm of logistic space in Cluj.
Closely related to the retailers’ evolution, logistic operators are developing their operations on the local market, with Tibbett Logistics, KLG or Kuehne + Nagel, leasing nearly 25,000 sqm of warehouse space in Q1.”
We estimate that for the whole year the total demand will exceed 350,000 sqm. Bucharest and the large secondary cities such as Timișoara, Oradea or Cluj will attract the gross of the new demand. As a new trend, we are witnessing increasing interest for the east part of Romania, the most notable example being the lease of Profi in Roman.
Another record level of 400,000 sqm has been announced to be delivered by the end of 2017, as developers are encouraged by the low vacancy and record demand to further expand their existing parks or to start new projects. The largest projects scheduled to be completed this year are the 60,000 sqm extension of CTPark Bucharest West, the 60,000 sqm extension of P3 Logistic Park, the 38,000 sqm new project of WDP in Otopeni and CTPark Timisoara with 35,000 sqm.
The new projects planned to be delivered this year will increase the total stock to almost 3 million sqm. Existing stock of industrial and logistic space in Romania reached 2.5 million sqm at the end of last year, out of which 1.2 million sqm was in Bucharest.