Month: August 2018

Rome, the black summer of retail

23 August, Corriere della Sera

Accounts in the red for shops Rome which add up to the current recession. According to the president of Confesercenti Lazio, Valter Giammaria, there are 10 thousand empty shops in Rome. Besides, 2 thousand business shut down every year, and the continuous changes in management have reached an average of 25%. Basically, a shop every four changes its management every year.

After an unsuccessful sales season, with average losses from 15% to 25% (the centre registered the lowest numbers), retailers have started wondering about the upcoming autumn. “We can hope in the recovery only if there are a significant countertrend and a considerable reduction of taxation. Otherwise, there won’t be any relaunch”, says Valter Giammaria. And he adds: “We need initiatives at national level and events attracting Italian and international tourists. The city needs a different image, not how it appears now in the newspapers. We need to bring back order and rules in retail”.

Moreover, “Unauthorised businesses are a constant issue: it damages the sector, and its level has escalated. In the whole region, the sales of counterfeit products amount to 2 billion and 350 million. Unauthorised merchandise can reach a turnover of 10 billion”. The Confesercenti president is worried: “Salaries are no longer proportioned to the cost of living, and consumptions have consistently dropped. The reasons for the crisis of local businesses are many: shopping centres, internet, etc. But the truth is that families don’t have money to spend”.

David Sermoneta, Confcommercio for Rome old town, agrees with that: “The negative trend is relentless, and we’re touching the bottom. We’re sinking and cannot resurface anymore”. According to Sermoneta, low-cost tourists are to blame, as they not only don’t buy but also “deter customers”. After the all, “the cheaper the area gets, the more paying customers go elsewhere”.  Giovanna Marchese Bellaroto, Cna Commercio, confirms this vision: “We’re at a standstill, the worst for the industry”. And clouds seem to be approaching the horizon: “There isn’t any element making us wish for a better autumn. There are no strategies in place. Shopkeepers can’t take it anymore. The only opportunity is the development of the Region’s “business networks”, but they’re not enough if they’re not supported by the recovery of businesses in the city”.

Source: Corriere della Sera

Translator: Cristina Ambrosi

 

Brescia, Piazza Vittoria: Italmark will occupy the old Standa department stores

29 August, Corriere della Sera

There’s a lot of activity in the former Standa in Piazza Vittoria. The property was empty for years, and then it had been acquired by Immobiliare Impero, which invested 10 million for its requalification (expected to be completed by the end of 2019). The architects Fausto Baresi and Riccardo Manfredi will renovate the building using glass, marble and green spaces. The project includes the implementation of luxury apartments at the fifth, sixth and seventh floors; while the second, third and fourth floors will probably accommodate offices (the initial plan was suggesting a gym). The first floor is destined to commercial properties, but it still has to be let. On the ground floor, an Italmark supermarket of the Brescia group Odolini will open. The supermarket will focus on high-quality products, offering also ready-made dishes. It will compete with the Conad supermarket which will open a Sapori&Dintorni store on the other side of the square (at Quadriportico), also offering dining services and local products.

The inauguration was initially scheduled by the end of 2017, but it was postponed by a year. If there used to be a lack of supermarkets in the centre of Brescia, now there will be an offer excess, also considering the Pam store in Via Fratelli Porcellaga.

Source: Corriere della Sera

Translator: Cristina Ambrosi

Dea Capital real estate sold a property in Viale Monza in Milan for 49 million

28 August, Bebeez

In the past few weeks, Dea Capital Real Estate SGR has sold to a private company a property located in Viale Monza 259-265 in Milan owned by the fund Atlantic 2 – Berenice. The fund is listed in the MIV segments of the Italian stock market.

The property is composed of four buildings, mainly offices, and it was sold for 49.535 million (before taxes). The price is 8.16% higher than the price reported on the fund’s biannual report dated 30th June 2018, namely 45.8 million.

Following the sale, the asset management company will proceed with a partial reimbursement pro rata for a total amount of 40.2 million euro, corresponding to 67 euro for each of the 600,0003 shares issued by the fund.

Atlantic 2 – Berenice is a private contribution fund incorporated in July 2015 with the maturity set on 31st December 2018. The fund has sold other seven assets (three in Milan, two in Turin, one in Palermo and one in Gallipoli) last May. At present, it still holds two assets in its portfolio for which there are already preliminary sales agreements, while the final contracts are expected by the September 2018.

Source: Bebeez

Translator: Cristina Ambrosi

Neif II acquires the office building Guarico in Rome

29 August, Linkedin

The asset is a multi-tenant office complex and fully let. Built in 2012, the building features almost 7,400 sqm of total office area offering Class A office accommodation in a prime office location. The property is located in the EUR Laurentina area, where many high tech and industrial companies such as Mitsubishi and ENEL are established, with a very good connection to the public transport.

Laurent Boissin, Fund Advisor for the NEIF II fund, comments: “We are pleased to announce the successful completion of the acquisition phase of NEIF II. The acquisition of “Gaurico” represents the 12th transaction on behalf of NEIF II and the fund volume stands now at above € 800m. This last acquisition is perfectly in line with the fund strategy, aiming a geographic diversification in the main cities of the Eurozone with a focus on sustainability”.

NEIF II is a European fund offering diversification in the Eurozone office sector to international institutional investors. Its successor NEIF III fund, launched in 2017, started successfully its investment phase in the Eurozone while aiming a distribution of 4% p.a.

Source: Linkedin

 

Rent prices have decreased in Rome

29 August, Il Tempo

Renting has always been a big issue for students, as they have to deal with high rent prices or even actual scams such properties not matching with was promised in the ad or the total lack of lease contracts. Every end of August, students start looking for accommodation. But this year, according to Scenari Immobiliari, some cities have been spared by the price increase. The capital is a positive surprise, as it turned out to be the only Italian city where rent prices have decreased by almost 2% from last year. Meanwhile, Milan beats all the cities with record prices.

More in detail, Milan, Palermo and Bologna registered a rise of rent prices; while Pavia and Siena, two popular student cities, have remained stable. While Milan has reached an average of 543 euro a month for a single room and has increased by 3% in the last year, a single room in Rome costs 428 euro and prices have decreased 2% due to the reduction of demand. Bologna is the third city reporting the highest rates, with prices for single rooms increased by 12% in the last year and the average price set at 400 euro. Prices are also rising in Bari, Naples, Catania and Padua, which have grown by over 5% on a yearly basis. Palermo registered a record, as renting a single room here will cost 14% more compared to last year, with an average price of 226 euro a month. Students know it’s possible to save money. It only takes to give up space. Who decides to share the room will save a considerable amount of money, to the point that the demand for twin rooms has grown by 3% nationally. The average price for a shared room is 285 euro a month, although each city differs considerably. In Milan, the price for a shared room is 368 euro, while in Rome is 305. The distance from the university and the conditions of the property make the difference, to the point that certain rents in Rome can cost up to 500 euro. Prices are definitely more affordable in the south of the country: in Bari, Catania and Palermo, the average rent doesn’t go beyond 200 euro, same as in Pavia. The most significant variations don’t concern only prices but the offer too. Some cities, for instance, have reported a substantial reduction in the offer, like Bologna with -9%. The reason behind is that the demand which once used to concentrate in end of August and beginning of September is now spread throughout the year, reducing the number of available accommodations.

In the meanwhile, there is good news coming from the 2018 Anvur report for those looking to rent to students. To the 91 Italian universities attended by approximately 1.7 million students, we must also add the over 63 thousand students of the Afam system (Conservatories of Music, Academies of Fine Arts, Musical Institutes) and other 15t thousand from other institutes such as higher education technical institutes and linguistic mediation institutes. Finally, we must also consider the teachers and the researchers. The number of enrolled students has grown in the past five years: it was over 290 thousand in 2017-2018, in comparison with the 270 thousand in 2012-2013. According to Tecnocasa, 8.6% of the tenants is a university student, especially in Turin, Milan and Bologna, where the rented properties are mainly one- and two-bedroom apartments.

Source: Il Tempo

Translator: Cristina Ambrosi

The Region of Veneto selling Palazzo Balbi in Venice

29 August, Il Sole 24 Ore

The Region of Veneto is about to put for sale over 100 properties for a total value of 160 million euro. The Region has recently updated and disclosed its requalification and divestiture plan. The program includes historic buildings and student residences, agricultural lands and custom houses. The jewel though is the headquarter of the Regional Council, Palazzo Balbi, located on Canal Grande in Venice. The property will be put on the market with a starting price of 26 million euro.

Another prime property is the headquarters of the Regional Administrative Court (Tar), Palazzo Gussoni. The price is 13 million. The offices in Rome in Via del Tritone (9 million) and in Brussels (2.8 million) are also for sale. There are also properties on offer at more affordable prices such as the custom house in Cencenighe Agordino for 35 thousand euro. The optimisation plan of the Region’s real estate assets follows a round of sales completed last year. That time, the Region sold seven properties obtaining earnings for 8.1 million euro.

Source: Il Sole 24 Ore

Translator: Cristina Ambrosi

York is buying the Ministry’s offices

29 August, Milano Finanza

The newly-elected Minister for the Environment Sergio Costa has decided to move. After decades in the headquarters located in Viale Cristoforo Colombo in Rome, the Ministry’s offices will move in 2019 to a building in Trastevere. The reason is not only of economic nature, like the lease contract but also due to the contrast between the Ministry and the owner of the building, namely Dea Capital with its fund Alpha. The reason for the contrast, which has been going on for the last 15 years, concerns the renovation works of the building. In 2011 the Land Registry Office approved the renewal of the contract at the condition that the works for the total renovation of the building would have been planned, but this never happened. As a result, the Ministry for Environment continued renting the building with the compensation for the occupation. Now Minister Costa decided to find a new headquarter and avoiding appearing in Court against Italy’s biggest asset manager, property of the De Agostini group from Novara.

Having considered the significant dimensions of the building (30 thousand Sq m) and the plentiful of potential tenants, Dea Capital has recently accepted the binding offer worth 53 million from the international fund York representing a pool of American investors. The procedure has been long and complex, having taken nearly one year, and it has finalised this summer, although the closing for the preliminary sales agreement will be on 30th September.

Quinta Capital Partners was the strategic advisor of York for the operation. The company was created from a spin-off the Italian branch of the British asset manager Negentropy. Luca Turco is Quinta Ceo; he has previously covered managerial positions in the real estate sector in companies such as Prelios, Feidos and Fimiti (today Dea Capital Sgr). Among the members of the Board of Directors, there are Carlo Lassandro (Equitalia Giustizia and prior than that Ferrovie Italiane) and Sayonara Naccach (Merrill Lynch and Commerzbank).  Just a few months ago, Quinta had finalised some important operations like the acquisition on behalf of an American hedge fund of some unlet assets together with a building office complex in Rome from a Pan European fund of Deutsche Bank, as well as an asset located in Via Moscova, Milan city centre.

Source: Milano Finanza

Translator: Cristina Ambrosi

Milan: the Aler properties are for auction

24 August, Libero Milano

Aler sold houses in Milan from the 1st January to 28th June have been 204, including some properties in the city centre, from two-bedroom apartments in Via Pascoli, the elegant neighbourhood in Città Studi, to 70 Sq m houses in Viale Tibaldi.

The Aler sales strategy proves to be successful: 19 million euro from the beginning of the year. The earnings will be re-invested in the maintenance of public housing estate. The regional housing authority doesn’t only own apartment blocks in council estates, it also has hundreds of apartments in privately-owned buildings. The properties aren’t currently let and have never been published in any public tender for their assignment to a tenant; therefore, they represent a cost for the company. Better sell them and use the proceeds from the sales to carry out maintenance works on the rented apartments.

Sales are announced generally every month. The last one was on 28th June and saw the adjudication of 33 apartments earning 3.7 million euro, one million more than the auction base price. The auction concerned semi-central areas and suburbs, as well as residential neighbourhoods and city outskirts.

The list

The locations range from Affori to Viale Argonne, from Ticinese to Bonola. The common element is the very low prices compared to the market ones. Perfect for those who want to invest in the Milan property market. On 28th June, two apartments in Via Pascoli were put for auction with a starting price respectively of 62 thousand and 98 thousand euro and were sold at 161 and 224 thousand euro. The next sale is scheduled for 27th September for 43 properties distributed all over the city. Some of them are in the hinterland, namely the apartments in San Donato Milanese, Cesano Boscone and Cologno Monzese. The auctions are included in Aler recovery plan in conformity with the regional regulation introduced by the Region of Lombardy in 2014 for the divestiture of about 10 thousand properties of the company, including commercial spaces, garages and apartments that are too small to be out for auction.

The recovery plan

Aler has three objectives: facilitating the purchases with particularly convenient prices, achieving a more efficient management of its assets, incentivising the sales of the apartments in privately-owned buildings.

In the meanwhile, the company is also selling the rents apartments to their tenants at particularly convenient prices.

Among the properties on sales, there is also a whole building in Via Andrea Costa 20 in the Lulli area which was built in 1911 by Giannino Ferrini. The building used to accommodate the Aler offices, but it’s possible to convert into a residential property. The price for the two-storey building developing on a 500 Sq m surface is set at 1.8 million euro.

Source: Libero Milano

Translator: Cristina Ambrosi

Everybody is crazy for NoLo, Milan’s trendiest area

24 August, Il Fatto Quotidiano

How is an urban myth created? In Milan, everybody’s crazy for NoLo. It’s the new brand standing for North of Loreto (like SoHo in New York stands for South of Houston), comprised between Loreto, Via Palmanova and Ferrante Aporti, basically the railway tracks of the Central Station. The area has never been considered of any significant value, with its square reminding more to a motorway junction and Via Padova frequented by groups of the extreme right. The shops and businesses in the area are mainly run by foreigners from China, South America, Egypt and Pakistan. Now NoLo has become trendy.

The area has seen the opening of bars, especially around Piazza Morbegno (Ghepensi Mi, Salumeria del Design, NoLoSo, Caffineria, etc.). Art galleries have opened, together with architect studios, cultural centres and coworking spaces. Radio NoLo has started broadcasting from here. The NoLo Social District was created, connecting the social streets in the area and creating a Facebook page with 6 thousand users and a waiting list of 1,500. Nobody talks about the stabbings, the gangs of “latinos”, or the neglect. The local newspapers and the socials happily twit: the area of young creatives is born.

According to the legend, perhaps is true, the NoLo brand was born in Brooklyn. “The idea of NoLo came out about five years ago”, said Francesco Cavalli, LeftLoft founder and creative director, a design and marketing company with offices in Milan and New York which also worked on the rebranding for Moleskine, Mondadori and Inter. “I was at the Brooklyn Social Bar with Luisa Milani and Walter Molteni, two designers of La Tigre studio. We were joking about the idea of creating a brand for a neighbourhood, a sort of a container for its transformation, as artists, professionals and young people started moving in the area”. This part of the city was rough, yet not far away from the centre, apartments were cheaper than elsewhere. As a result, young people started moving here, as they couldn’t afford houses in better places. They were okay with sharing the place with the urban melting pot made of thousands of ethnicities, languages and origins in an area that used to be proletarian in the Seventies was.

In the past few years, immigrants and young people joined the working-class population. A partial gentrification process started, as it happened with Isola, which saw the transformation of a working-class neighbourhood into the centre of Milan’s nightlife, with the resulting spike of property prices. Cavalli concludes: “after all, NoLo ended up being a rebranding operation at zero costs thanks to word of mouth. We started using this name, and it started circulating”.  Today, the brand is used by real estate agencies for selling or renting houses at inflated prices. Those suspecting a carefully-planned marketing operation are probably exaggerating. What is certain is that who bought a house, a studio or a loft here more than five ago can see the property’s real estate value multiplied.

On the other hand, the diffused racism has decreased; while the right mix of Chinese massage parlours, Middle Eastern kebabs places, South American shops and hipster and trendy bars has grown. People here can pretend to live in New York. At least until people will start kicking out immigrants.

Source: Il Fatto Quotidiano

Translator: Cristina Ambrosi

The property market is still cautious after a positive 2017

09 August, Ask News

Contrary to the expectations, the economic growth has slowed down, resulting in more careful business strategies. The picture emerges from the survey “Sentiment of the property market”, created from an idea of Valter Mainetti, Sorgente Group Ceo, and carried out by Claudio Cacciamani, a professor at the University of Parma. Along with the other real estate analyses (the recent reports by Scenari Immobiliari for instance), the survey reports that, after the dynamic trend of 2017, 2018 seems to have settled into a more moderate growth.

In the first quarter of 2018, the players of the sector said to be positive regarding the economic recovery and more optimistic than in the past, despite the Fiup (the index expressing the sentiment) went from 19.59 to 19.51. The report carried out by the Economics and Business Faculty of the University of Parma in collaboration with Sorgente Group and Federimmobiliare surveys about 200 operators from trading, development, property management, facility management, planning, evaluation, consultancy and real estate finance.

Regarding numbers, 62.5% of the people surveyed say that the main macroeconomic indicators have improved, while 45% expect a further growth in the next months. They look positively at real estate, even though the market has stabilised according to the 28%. Judging from the dynamic business community, which continues gathering at events and exhibitions of the industry, the main question is how to adjust the operational and investment strategies according to the changed economic and social trends.

The direct consequence of this attitude is the belief that prices will stay on the recent values, or that they will moderately grow, while the times to sell will remain unchanged or even increase. Concerning the geographical areas, the North-West reports the biggest growth in all the segments except for the industrial one, which prevails instead in the North-East, while the Centre and the South have excellent opportunities in hospitality. Rome is second after Milan in terms of investments in residential properties, offices and shops; while the capital is first for hotel investments. Both in Rome and Millan, the focus is on the city centre regarding commercial properties; while office investments prefer semi-central areas. Finally, investments in industrial properties concentrate in the city outskirts.

The outlook regarding the investments choices of big investors remains substantially the same: retirement funds, insurance companies and social insurance funds will continue investing in real estate financial instruments. However, the choices are selective and often focused on the optimisation of the real estate assets. Big investors, especially retirement funds, aim at offices, as the preference in this segment has gone from 50% to 70%. Another interesting segment is hospitality.

Finally, another trend concerns the direct connection between the growing inflation and real estate, which generally represents a safe investment despite the economic trends. PIRs are also seen as an important instrument for the growth of the sector, according to 58.5% of the interviewed.

Source: Ask News

Translator: Cristina Ambrosi