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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.

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Romania is a separate case in regard not only to the European real estate market in general, but in regard to the markets in the former communist countries, and in Central and Eastern Europe in particular. Unlike most of them which started to implement liberal economic policies right after the fall of the iron curtain in 1989, in Bucharest until 1996 the former communists (under a new party name) were in power. The non-communist government coalition that has followed since then was a mixture of social-democrats, liberals and christian-democrats who didn't succeed to put the economy on track. The result was an economic decline, growing inflation and depression on the real estate markets in the last years. The coming presidential and parliament elections this autumn risk to bring again into power the former communists. All these circumstances show some of the main obstacles to the development of the national economy and the real estate market. The only kind of buyers that are still present on the Romanian real estate market (concentrated mainly in the capital of Bucharest) are the foreign companies and their expatriate employees who can afford the prices, prohibitive to ordinary Romanians.

Geographically and economically Romania is divided into three regions -- poor in the South and East and relatively more developed Northwest (Transylvania) plus the capital city of Bucharest, situated in the South. This separation follows the lines of influence during the Middle Ages between the catholic West and the orthodox and muslim East. For most of the past centuries Transylvania was ruled by Hungary and Austria and there still are very important Hungarian and German minorities (approximately 10 percent of the whole population in Romania). The Southern and Eastern parts of the country were subdued by the Ottoman Turks and in the most recent times before World War I they were dominated by the Russian Empire.

After the fall of communism many Hungarians and Germans preferred to move to Hungary and Germany creating a huge supply on the real estate market which wasn't met by an increasing demand. The result was that prices of real estate properties in Transylvania fell and this trend was accelerated by the continuing migration westward. In the last ten years hundred of thousands of Romanian Romas (Gypsies) from all parts of the country also moved into the other European states. The official statistic doesn't reflect this decrease in the population. On paper, as in the communist times, the Romanian population is 22.3 million. In reality it isn't more than 21 million. and more than 30 percent of the remaining Romanians have some plans to emigrate westward. The demographic trends have been further aggravated by the extremely liberal abortion policy in the last 10 years, in sharp contrast with the former communist regime's policy before 1989 that has banned abortion in order to stimulate the population increase.

The rural Southern and Eastern regions also began to experience increasing rural migration toward the big cities (more than one third of the population is still occupied in agriculture). This move isn't reflected in the real estate development because the average salary in Romania hardly reaches $80-90 a month.

The only places in the country where the demand for real estate is strong are the downtown and northern areas of Bucharest. That is due exclusively to the western and other foreign companies renting office buildings and residential properties for their expatriate employees. There the monthly rents for new offices class A (the best by international standards) can reach $40 /sq.meter (1 sq.meter= 10 sq. feet). Class B rents are reaching some $20-25 /sq.meter per month.

Rents for residential properties in the capital are prohibitive not only for ordinary citizens but also for rich Romanians. This is due not to huge demand but primarily to small supply. (Several residential areas in Bucharest, 40,000 apartments and private houses, were totally destroyed on order of the former communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, and new construction was minimal). In such a market even a small amount of cash-backed demand causes real estate prices to skyrocket. For example, rent for a 2BR flat in downtown Bucharest averages $800-1200 per month, while prices in north Bucharest range from $1500 to $2000. A 3BR flat downtown is about $1000-1500 a month, and on the north side - $2000 to 2500. Furthermore, a 4BR flat in downtown Bucharest is $1500-2000, and in the north - $3000-4000. A villa larger than 200 sq.meters in the downtown can be rented for $3500-4500 and in north Bucharest - for $4000-6000 a month. Note: all these prices are not for luxurious parts of Manhattan in New York but for Bucharest where the average salary is $80-90 a month.

The real estate market in Romania is small, but it gets even smaller thanks to the government rules. Only Romanian citizens who live in the country can own and lease both land and buildings. Land may be transferred between resident nationals or to joint ventures with local participation. Agricultural land owned privately is limited to 10 hectares (25 acres). Foreign nationals can't own or lease land or buildings, they can only obtain concessions as users for up to 49 years through local joint venture companies.

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