Belgrade is short of 100,000 square meters in housing space, CBRE says

Last year, an average price of apartments in Belgrade was 1,190 Euros in old buildings and about 2,050 Euros in new ones, with three central districts, Vracar, Stari Grad and Savski Venac, topping the price list, CBRE Group, which is operating more than 450 offices worldwide, with clients in over 100 countries, said.

The group, the largest company of its kind in the world, said the selling price of flats in Belgrade would remain more or less the same in 2019. It should be the case with the rent cost for office space too, i.e., from 15,5 to 16,5 Euros per square meter a month in 2018. The lower prices could be expected in 2020.

CBRE said that in 2018 construction permits were issued for over 700,000 square meters in different categories.

“Though the prices were going up in the last few years, the selling of apartments was on the rise. Most of them were bought before the end of construction, and even 82 percent were paid for in cash,” the group managing director for South-East Europe (SEE) Andrew Pierson, said.

Belgrade currently has 450,000 square meters of space in office buildings, additional 140,000 class A premises are in construction, and it is expected that 60,000 square meters will be finished this year.

The majority will be situated in the New Belgrade municipality which already houses the headquarters of big foreign companies and banks.

That, according to CBRE, will increase the availability of office space for some 10 percent which is a minimum for attracting new big tenants.

Compared to other regional cities, office space rents are more expensive in Belgrade due to higher demand.

CBRE says that in 2019 and 2020, some additional 170,000 square meters of the Western-style shopping malls will be built in Belgrade.

That, according to the group, should attract new brands to the market, and the fall in rent prices for some 20 percent by 2021, from the current 27 to 29 Euros per square metre a month in the existing shopping centres.

Flats’ prices in Belgrade are lower than in Zagreb and Ljubljana, the capitals of Croatia and Slovenia, and more expensive than in Skopje, Podgorica and Sarajevo, Macedonian, Montenegrin and Bosnian capitals.