Archived Articles

Simeon Mitropolitski is a Canadian analyst, of Bulgarian origin, and a former syndicated columnist with the Bulgarian News Agency (BTA). He is the author of several hundred articles dealing with hot political and economic topics, both national and international.

He was part of the first group of Bulgarian intellectuals and students that began the opposition movement that finally put an end to the communist regime in this country in 1989, and in 1996-1997 participated in international observation teams during the elections in several Balkan countries - Romania, Albania and Bulgaria.

In 2002 Simeon and his family moved from Bulgaria to Canada where they live now in Montreal, province of Quebec. Simeon is a Master of Political Science from McGill University and a B.A. of Political Science and History.

Global Real Estate Project
News Index

Directories
  Int'l Realty
  US Realty

What have in common the Italian state, the local giant industrial corporations like Fiat and the American investment banks operating in Italy like Goldman Sachs? Today they sell their real estate portfolio hoping for extra money to cover their different financial projects. Some of them, the same Goldman Sachs will invest the money in new properties, other like Fiat will use it to pay for company restructuring, the Italian state will try to finance the public deficit that threatens to endanger the monetary stability in the Eurozone*. In other words, the keyword today in Italy is to sell that looks like a big retail liquidation on the Easter Eve.

Add to this massive sell off the fact that the capital returns on the commercial real estate market in Rome and Turin have fallen to only 5% per year and you'll understand why some experts predict that 2002 will be a year without new sq. feet delivered on the market. They predict also that the next year will be better but given the unclear economic situation and the sell off orchestrated by the state, the large companies and banks, nobody can bet on that.

On he other hand, there is widespread opinion among the experts that the Italian market needs more and massive investments on the office and retail market. They point out on the fact that the total commercial surface in Rome and Turin is less than 50% of that in the French capital Paris. The existing spaces as a whole don't meet the international standards and so far don't reflect the true image of the country as one of the big economic powerhouses in the world.

But when we talk about selling we have to see what the buyer's profile looks like too. Some of the big buyers on the market are the same American investment banks like Goldman Sachs. Their strategy as manifested so far in Italy is to have as different as possible assets, then to sell them to more prudent investment funds like the European pension funds for management.

As far as the Italian state is concerned the main target groups of this sell off are the tenants living in the state-owned housings. Many of them will have the right to buy with some discount the apartments they have already occupied. So far seven pension funds in Italy have sold 25% of their housing assets (26.000 apartments and more than 250 commercial buildings). This allowed the state to receive almost $5 billion. The plans of the Italian government are to get additional $15 billion till the end of 2004. So far there isn't a word that Italian government has decided to sell the buildings housing the public agencies like post offices etc. But if the right-wing government stands for the years ahead we can expect that this buildings also will be turned into private hands. It's just a matter of time.

- - -
* - most of the EU countries with their own currency Euro form Eurozone.

--------------------

See also the directory of companies providing real estate services in, and general real estate information of Italy.