STRONG MOMENTUM IN THE PORTFOLIO SECTOR; HOWEVER, SALES DRIVERS ARE STILL LACKING
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The retail investment market carried the momentum from year-end 2024 into the first quarter of 2025, albeit without being able to report an extremely high total volume in the interim results. Despite the good market momentum and a total investment volume of around €1.28 billion, the first three months of the year merely lacked the key sales drivers that were still decisive in the same quarter of the previous year. This observation is underlined by the fact that larger transactions of €50 million or more fell by 45%, while deals up to the €50 million mark were able to roughly maintain their previous year's level (-5%).
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In a comparison of the three most important commercial property types, the retail investment market did not take the top position as it did 12 months ago, but overall the top asset classes are once again relatively close to each other in a long-term comparison: office investments have regained the lead with a good €1.7 billion, while logistics and retail properties are almost on a par at almost €1.3 billion each.
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The portfolio segment is sending out positive signals, achieving the best Q1 result of the last 5 years (€682 million) and thus generating a higher volume than individual deals (€598 million). This phenomenon has only occurred sporadically over the years and was generally associated with larger company takeovers. The very good demand situation in the portfolio sector is currently primarily benefiting the retail warehouse and food sector which contributes almost 65% to the total. Shopping centres account for almost 22%, demand for high street properties remains consistently high, particularly in the small-scale segment (around 11%) and department stores' investments have so far recorded a low 3%.