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Over 130 representatives of local business and key players in the local and international real estate market gathered to hear about development trends of the city of Wrocław. After an introduction by Ilona Chodorowska, the BPCC’s director for Wrocław & Poznań, Łukasz Czajkowski, director of the Business Support Centre in Wroclaw Agglomeration Development Agency presented the impact of external investments over the past decade on the city’s development and set out future development directions.
Dorota Kościelniak, partner at Knight Frank, summarised the office market in 2015 and presented forecasts for this year. Piotr Śliwka, managing director of Sotheby's Poland, introduced Sotheby’s Poland, a luxury real estate agent company which has just entered Polish market from the UK. The potential of Wrocław Central Business District in Wrocław was highlighted by Paweł Boczar, associate director at CBRE, who identified three potential directions in which city’s office market would develop. One of those covers a brand new district designed and built by Vantage Development. Maciej Moralewicz, the firm’s commercialisation manager, explained how the company revitalises post- industrial areas turning them into comfortable living and working urban areas.
Jarosław Solima, key account manager at Kinnarps, identified typical distractors in office space and explained how to minimalise or avoid them. Then Artur Winnicki, partner at Reesco, presented the differing methods of measuring commercial space in Poland and the need to standardise them based on international best practice. The new Vastint Business Garden project was presented by Ewa Łydkowska, Vastint’s marketing manager, raising much interest among participants. Dominik Łoś, senior property negotiator at CBRE, shared his knowledge on the attractiveness of industrial and warehouse market among equity investors, as well as the influence of the rapid growth in e-commerce on warehouse market development. Finally, Katarzyna Kubicka, senior leasing manager at Echo Investment, showcased Echo’s latest investments in the Wrocław office market.
The conference was wrapped up by a lively discussion panel led by Paweł Boczar. The question of whether Wrocław has enough space for what could properly be called a Central Business District raised a heated discussion. But other issues like housing projects or luxury properties in Wrocław were also eagerly discussed.
One of the event’s attractions was an opportunity to learn how to ride a Segway, which requires a lot of skill and good balance!
The Wrocław Agglomeration Real Estate Forum grows from strength to strength; each year there are more participants, speakers and content partners. The Forum’s popularity reflects the dynamism of Wrocław’s commercial and residential real estate markets.
