At the Heart of Europe
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No. 2 | 2010 places spaces The Real Estate Magazine of Union Investment Demography How population trends impact on property markets Tenant loyalty How landlords seek to convince their clients At the heart of Europe Paris is Europe’s number one office location, making it twice as hard for other french regions to compete with the capital CONTENTS TO THE POINT COVER STORY Most property capital set to flow to China and India 4 France Paris is dominating developments in the office market By Bernhard Köhler 9 Regions Gaël Thomas, Editor-in-Chief of ‘Business Immo’, on France’s regional property markets 11 Investment strategy Interview with Karl-Joseph Hermanns-Engel, Member of the Management Board of Union Investment Real Estate GmbH he future of property investment lies in Asia. Many will be building from scratch the equivalent of the USA’s cur- MARKETS real estate professionals now share this view – even if rent housing stock. Many of these new cities exist only on the Outlook: The Paris office market European investors remain sceptical towards some Asian drawing board at present – planned as satellite towns in the 12 Demography Population growth worldwide is impacting T leaves the crisis behind. Page 4 on global property markets markets. Language barriers, cultural differences and differing suburbs of existing centres. For us Europeans, developments of market and legal systems cause uncertainty. Nevertheless, a this dimension and speed are unimaginable – and even alarm- CONCEPTS large part of global property capital is set to move to Asia in the ing. Yet the growth has a solid financial basis, as a glance at the Review: Where the population is 16 Environmental building materials The choice of materials plays decades ahead. The continent will soon knock the USA and even Chinese savings rate shows. At 35 percent of disposable income, growing fastest. an important role in the planning of sustainable buildings Europe off the top spots. Asia – led by the two giants China and it is the highest worldwide. EU citizens on the other hand save Page 12 20 Defining issue Josef Steretzeder, Lindner AG, talks about building India – owes this leading position not only to the impressively on average just under 14 percent of their disposable income. materials and their life cycle assessment high growth rates of their economies. The demographic reasons All this means that property investors and fund managers 21 Website www.sustainable-realestate-investments.com behind this domination – rapid population growth and the trend will no longer be able to ignore Asia’s markets in future. These providing information on the scope for sustainable buildings towards urbanisation – are a powerful catalyst for the property emerging countries promise not only attractive yields but also 22 Tenant retention Companies expect more than just financial markets of the two countries. For example, India’s population sustained demand. Many concerns over legal certainty and also incentives from landlords is growing by almost 1.5 percent per year. With its 1.16 billion language barriers will have to be dispelled however. Such obsta- 25 Tenant credit rating Investors attach importance to solvent tenants inhabitants, making India the second most populous nation on cles can be overcome though. Collaboration with established 28 Architectural photography How buildings are prepared for photographic work Earth after China, another 25 million people are added to its Asian partners has proved to be a sustainable investment strat- population every year. This is equivalent – putting it simply – to egy. They usually invest their own money in the joint venture Portfolio rebuilding Switzerland three times a year in order to maintain structures created, are very familiar with the legal and real estate Insight: Which the ratio of inhabitants to housing stock. Moreover, around a constraints imposed by their home markets and can considerably building materials 26 Currency management Global property investments are hedged are regarded as against currency fluctuations third of Indians are under the age of 15 – creating huge demand reduce the learning curve of western investors in Asia. In return sustainable. for living and working space, shopping centres and hotels for the they benefit from the property expertise and organisational talent Page 16 MISCELLANEOUS years to come. of their western partners. Setting up a cor- 3 To the point Bernhard Köhler, Swisslake Capital AG, looks at the The rate of development in China is responding platform and selecting reliable booming property markets in China and India no less impressive. With some 1.3 bil- experts across differing regions enables a 32 News Property assets invested worldwide; companies scrutinising lion inhabitants, the People’s Republic is far-reaching diversification of investment, building costs; property income stabilising; sustainable corporate management currently the largest nation on Earth. In forming the basis for successful involve- a country with a state-imposed one child ment in Asian property markets. It will be 33 News Union Investment’s investment climate survey; Volker Noack joins Union Investment’s management team; comparison of rents per family policy, it is not population but fascinating to watch when Europe’s core at Europe’s shopping centres; sales of distressed properties increase urbanisation that is the biggest driver of investors also discover for themselves the 34 News 2010 Prime Property Award; EBS engages in carbon- property markets. Owing to the increas- booming property markets of the world’s neutral research; book tip: “Asian Design Destinations” Perspective: How ing industrialisation of agriculture and the two most populous nations. photographers view 34 Imprint/Contact resulting reduction in sources of income, architecture. Page 28 some 300 to 500 million Chinese nation- Bernhard Köhler, Chief COVER PICTURE Europe’s largest office city lies in Paris: La Défense in the west of the French als are set to move from the countryside to Executive Officer and Founder of Swisslake Capital AG based capital offers on the 160-hectare site three million square metres of office space. towns over the next 20 years. To put this Some 1,600 companies are based here, including 13 of the world’s 50 largest in Pfäffikon, Switzerland. groups of companies. Photos: Uwe Schmid (Cover); Frank Heuer/laif; Bildagentur-online; Karsten Adrian Swisslake Schulz; Kramer; into context: over this period the Chinese [email protected] 2 places & spaces 2|2010 places & spaces 2|2010 3 COVER STORY rance is Paris, it is said, because for centuries, the splendour of the capital and its environs with its now some 12 million-strong Europe’s largest property market holds its own Fpopulation has outshone the country’s remaining major cities. Other major French centres such as Lyon, Toulouse or Marseille may have emerged a little from under the shadow of the omnipresent Following turbulent months the French office investment market is undergoing a period of recovery. capital in recent years but property investors continue to focus on Paris and especially on the Île-de-France. With 50 million square Yet risks remain. Office rents in particular could still recede somewhat. By Christiane Harriehausen metres of office space, it is the biggest and by far the most dynamic market in the country. Foreign investors – led by German real estate professionals – also like to buy in Paris. The property market is regarded as very The Paris office transparent and less susceptible to fluctuation. The city has its district of La diverse economic structure in particular to thank for this. Unlike Défense lies on London, which as Europe’s key financial centre is dominated by the west bank of banks and related service companies, a balanced mix of industries the River Seine. Its in Paris provides great stability. In addition to a large number of office towers are service companies of all kinds, one quarter of France’s manufactur- the workplace of ing companies, ranging from companies of the chemical industry to 150,000 people. the electrical and mechanical engineering and automotive sectors, have chosen to be based in the Paris region. Investment market rebounding The consequences of the international financial and economic crisis have also left their mark on France. As in other European countries, the French property market has had to battle over the past two years with price corrections and difficult financing conditions. “2009 was a real crisis year for the property investment market,” reports Stephan von Barczy, Head of the French Investment Market with property consultancy Jones Lang LaSalle (JLL) in Paris. Whereas at the peak of the market in 2007 properties worth more than €20 bil- lion exchanged hands in Paris alone, the figure for 2009 was only about €5 billion. Throughout France the investment volume in com- mercial properties plummeted over the same period from €30 billion to €8.5 billion (see chart on page 10). “Everyone who had to sell did so during the first half of 2009. The other owners decided to wait and see, meaning that few interesting properties came onto the market, especially during the second half of 2009,” comments von Barczy. This is also reflected in the moderate results of the first quarter of 2010. “However, we expect that office properties worth €6–8 billion will exchange hands in Paris in 2010 because more real estate is gradually coming onto the market.” There were § France has weathered the crisis reasonably well Key economic indicators over recent years in percent GDP, real change 0.4 on previous year 1.3 1.5 –2.2 3.2 1.6 Inflation rate 0.1 1.4 10.2 10.1 8.0 9.5 Unemployment rate Disposable income, 3.2 real change on 1.0 2.4 previous year no data 2008 2009 2010* 2011* Photo: www.bildagentur-online.com/TIPS-Images Photo: *Forecast Source: GTAI, May 2010 4 places & spaces 2|2010 places & spaces 2|2010 5 COVER STORY Key office property markets in France at “103 Champs Élysées” for €400 million, which was sold by the Piani.