PROPERTY IN TIMES OF CRISIS
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| Issue 33, June 2009 |
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 It can be a good moment to invest in all types of properties (if you can afford to), not so much for the lower prices but because of the major shift in focus in the market. It is no longer the sellers but the buyers who call the shots. The crisis has undermined the rule that "a property costs as much as the seller says" ... more
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BUY PROPERTY IN BULGARIA SAFELY
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| Issue 32, May 2009 |
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 Buying real estate in Bulgaria can be a rewarding experience, and you can end up with a great house if you go about it sensibly. Unlike the UK Bulgaria doesn´t do buyer´s surveys. The Bulgarian way may be more laborious, but it usually works in the end. Property laws used to change frequently but, since joining the EU, the Bulgarian system is beginning to conform with that of other member states. ... more
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GO GREEN, EVERGREEN
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| Issue 31, April 2009 |
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 The commercial real estate market in Bulgaria is at a crossroads. All of the three commercial sectors - offices, retail and industrial - have felt the impact of the global economic downturn that started to affect Bulgaria during the last months of 2008 and continues this year. The slowdown has hit quite differently across the various sub-segments, depending on the stages of development. The question now is how we choose to manage the situation, and what will take off when the light changes to green. ... more
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WHAT A LOVELY CRISIS
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| Issue 30, March 2009 |
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 The tenants will become more sophisticated and internationalised. International decisionmakers in corporate real estate departments expect flexible floorspace and buildings that work ... more
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GATED IN OR BLOCKED OUT
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| Issue 28-29, January-February 2009 |
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 Prefab concrete apartment blocks appeared in the 1950s and 1960s as a cheap and efficient way to accommodate the large number of people who flocked to cities during Bulgaria's rapid urbanisation. The process peaked in the 1980s, when houses had become a luxury, a forgotten symbol of the "bourgeois past." In these years this type of housing development provided an unattractive but inexpensive way to accommodate hundreds or even thousands of people under one roof. ... more
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A ROOM WITHOUT A VIEW
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| Issue 28-29, January-February 2009 |
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 The year 2008 taught the world a bitter lesson - in economy terms, we're all in the same boat. No country is safe from the effects of a global crisis. During 2008 most players on the Bulgarian property scene were still in denial about the pending meltdown, hoping they could somehow avoid it. Now that the crisis is offcially here, what's to be expected? ... more
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SINK OR SWIM WITH THE PROPERTY BUBBLE
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| Issue 28-29, January-February 2009 |
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 Is the property boom a bubble on the point of bursting? While Bulgarians fretted over this question for the past year, the global economic "downturn" became a "crisis." The question now is whether Bulgaria has managed to dodge the bullet, as many experts would have us believe. If this were so, why has the property market in 2008 been much less dynamic than it was a year earlier? And is the British pullback to blame? ... more
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A MORTAGAGE MELTDOWN?
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| Issue 26, November 2008 |
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 Bulgarians who hold hefty mortgages may receive an unpleasant Christmas present from their banks, as yet another increase in interest rates on home loans is just around the corner. According to credit experts, rates will soon rise by 0.5 to 1 percentage point. Some banks have already pushed up their interest rates by almost 2 percentage points this year, and the base interest rate has reached 5.33 percent, its highest level in 10 years. ... more
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ATTACK OF THE KILLER BUILDINGS
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| Issue 25, October 2008 |
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Recently, a large chunk of the ceiling fell onto a patient in intensive care at the University Hospital of Plovdiv. Miraculously, the victim survived, suffering "only" a severe concussion. In both cases the official investigations attributed the tragedies to the fact that "the buildings were too old." If a building's age were a legitimate excuse, most of Europe's famous architectural monuments should have crumbled to dust by now. ... more
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CREDIT CRUNCH BLUES? NOT IN BULGARIA
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| Issue 25, October 2008 |
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In July a Bulgarian bank approved a 500,000 euro mortgage for an apartment in Sofia. To repay the loan, in the next 25 years the "lucky" borrower will pay monthly instalments of 3,500 euros. The media has been touting this record loan as an example that Bulgaria has successfully avoided the repercussions of the global credit crunch. But is this a fact or just wishful thinking? ... more
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