The share of investment transactions in the structure of sales in the primary housing market is about 15%, which is more than twice lower than the pre-war figure, according to a survey of developers conducted by Interfax-Ukraine.
“The share of investment apartments differs in different classes of residential real estate. The average rate of such transactions is about 15%. Since the beginning of last year, the share of apartments under development has remained virtually unchanged, while it has halved compared to the pre-war period,” KAN Development told the agency.
According to the company, the portrait of the investor has not changed significantly, but there are more buyers from the regions and those wishing to purchase multi-room, family apartments.
According to the developer Alliance Novobud, the share of investment transactions in its sales structure is currently on average 15%, while before the full-scale invasion the figure was 20-25% in Brovary and 30-40% in Kyiv.
According to Iryna Mikhalova, CMO of Alliance Novobud, there is a high demand for either finished or highly finished houses, but there is also growing interest in investing in the excavation stage due to the growing shortage of finished apartments.
“The portrait of the buyer has not changed much. Most often, these are people, private investors who are engaged in the rental business or plan to sell real estate by assignment. There are also legal entities that buy apartments in bulk for resale after renovation. They have high hopes for the demand from buyers under the “eOselya” and “eRestoration” programs,” the expert noted.
Kovalska Real Estate also noted a moderate recovery in investment demand. According to Igor Subotenko, the company’s director, the share of such transactions is currently 20% in the comfort class.
“Apartments are bought to save money and to increase the margin of start-finish construction, as the cost of each new project is getting higher,” he explained.
According to the expert, investors are interested in apartments for families of four or more people: zoned one-bedroom apartments of up to 60 square meters, two- and three-bedroom apartments of up to 110 square meters.
The share of investment demand in Intergal-Bud’s sales structure is currently 10-15%, while last year it was 5-10%, and before the full-scale invasion it was 40% or more. At the same time, the portrait of the investor has changed somewhat.
“Before the full-scale invasion, we recorded a considerable interest in primary investment among business owners and representatives of the IT industry. In 2021, young people, 28-30 years old, bought housing to earn money. Now these are people aged 40+, with almost no representatives of the technology and creative industries among them, but many employees and civil servants,” said Anna Laevska, Commercial Director of Intergal-Bud.
According to her, the share of IDPs among investors has also increased, as they invest their remaining savings in square meters to earn money after purchasing residential real estate.
According to Daria Bedia, Marketing Director of DIM Group, the developer’s clients mainly buy housing for themselves, but about 10% of transactions are investment. At the same time, most of the investors are professional, who previously had real estate in their portfolio.
One-bedroom apartments are in the greatest demand in the comfort+ class, while the requested area has decreased by an average of 15 square meters.
The Group is also considering introducing a format of income housing-apartments managed by a professional operator into its projects.
“This is a separate product that we are actively developing. In two of our projects, apartments with hotel services are designed as part of residential development. Among the added value are the best service for owners from well-known operators, the ability to comfortably accommodate relatives and friends in their homes without violating their privacy, and a well-developed internal infrastructure, as the apartments become a center of attraction for additional services: spa, restaurant, coworking, children’s areas, etc.” Bedia explained.
According to Roman Davymuka, CEO of Avalon, developers are actively developing additional services for investment housing.
“People are investing mainly in the long term – if in an apartment, then to make repairs and then receive rental income. We believe that special holistic services from the developer, including repairs, are the future of the product, and the market will develop into fully finished apartments,” he said.
Kovalska Real Estate is considering a turnkey renovation service. It is expected that the cost of repairs will be $400 per square meter. The service is planned to be launched in the new phase of Rusanivska Havan residential complex, the company’s director noted.
According to the press service of KAN Development, the developer has launched the KAN Market service, which allows customers to sell or lease their real estate and manage the full cycle.
For its part, Alliance Novobud is exploring various formats of additional services for investment housing, including the management of both apartments and parking spaces.
“We are considering engaging third-party partners to implement the collaboration, as well as an internal management company,” said Mikhaleva.
Bedia, DEVELOPER, DIM, HOUSING, Kovalska Real Estate, Суботенко
The REITER HALL project by NEST developer was awarded in the category “Historic Environment Renovation Project” at the UKRAINIAN SPECIAL BUILDING AWARDS IBUILD 2023.
IBUILD is the main construction award in Ukraine, which recognizes the best representatives of the construction industry – companies that have survived in the market, support the economy and contribute to the reconstruction.
This award is a recognition of the company’s philosophy, as NEST cares about the history of Kyiv and contributes to its preservation. NEST developer builds professionally and responsibly today, and creates real estate that will become a real landmark of the city in the future.
REITER HALL will become the future center of the city, where the past meets the future, creating a unique cultural space for the development of the boldest ideas of many generations of Kyiv residents.
Special attention was paid to the idea of REITER HALL, where, in addition to Ukrainian architects, a well-known Swedish architectural firm worked, because Sweden is rightly called one of the models of modern city planning – streets, public spaces and architecture. They like to turn such objects into comfortable spaces for their contemporaries. And medieval castles harmoniously coexist alongside masterpieces of modern architecture.
Another similar project of the developer is the HILLFORT Business Mansion, which also received a valuable award on December 11, 2019, and won the “Discovery of the Year” category in the “Best Historic Environment Renovation Project” nomination.
Each object of the NEST developer is valuable both now and in the future, as it is an architectural art.
Ukrainian company Augmented Pixels, which is based in Palo Alto (California, the United States) and develops products in the fields of navigation, digital mapping and virtual/augmented reality, has raised $2 million in investments.
“Augmented Pixels, Inc. closed a $2M funding round from current and new investors and completed the development of indoor navigation, earth-scale 3D mapping and cloud localization technologies,” CEO and Founder of Augmented Pixels Vitaliy Goncharuk has said.
Augmented Pixels will use the funds to continue its innovative R&D efforts while also expanding with an executive team based in the United States.
In general, the company has raised $7 million since 2015.
As reported, ICU invested in Augmented Pixels in July 2020. The amount of the investment was not disclosed.
The U.S. rocket and space technology developer Firefly Aerospace Inc., owned by Ukrainian businessman Maksym Polyakov plans to raise $350 million to scale up production and work on a medium-class launch vehicle – Firefly Beta.
Firefly Aerospace CEO Tom Markusic spoke about these plans during the IPO Edge webinar, the company’s press service said on Thursday.
“In the next five years we want to take Firefly from a $1 billion with Alpha to being on the order of a $10 billion company with a set of different launch vehicles,” Markusic said.
The company said $125 million of the funding would go toward production enhancements, such as facilities and tooling needed to ramp up launch vehicle production. The other $225 million would support growth initiatives, in particular a medium-class vehicle capable of placing 10 tonnes into orbit, about ten times more than the capacity of Alpha.
“Our development phase was $200 million, and that was funded by Maksym Polyakov and Noosphere Venture Partners […] Now we are considering expanding the list of investors in order to raise an additional $350 million, without impeding our ability or fundamentally changing our culture as a nimble, fast-moving space development company,” Markusic said.
He also confirmed plans for Alpha’s inaugural launch soon.
As reported, Firefly Aerospace has already performed checkouts of the Alpha launch vehicle.
As reported, Firefly Aerospace Inc. signed a Launch Services Agreement (LSA) with equipment and avionics company Adaptive Launch Solutions (ALS), which includes four launches of the Alpha rocket starting in 2021.
Ukraine’s Space Electric Thruster Systems (SETS) will provide its SPS-25 propulsion system for the inaugural launch of the Alpha rocket made by a rocket and space technology developer Firefly Aerospace Inc.
Caspian Service developer (Azerbaijan) intends to invest $7 million in its first own development project in Ukraine, the BASA City residential complex of the comfort+ class in the village of Khodosivka (Kyiv-Sviatoshynsky district, Kyiv region). “BASA City is the first full-scale project of Caspian Service in Ukraine as a developer. Despite temporary difficulties due to political processes, the Ukrainian housing market is very promising. The pilot project is being implemented in the comfort+ class, since, according to our estimates, today this is the most demanded and least risky segment in residential construction,” Chingiz Kishiyev, the CEO of Caspian Service in Ukraine, told Interfax-Ukraine.
According to him, the project includes nine five- to seven-storey houses, designed for 504 apartments. The land plot is located on the lake, not far from the Manufactura outlet village. Its area is 3.5 hectares, the total construction area is 35,000 square meters. The project will be implemented in two phases. The commissioning of the first of them is planned for the first quarter of 2021.
The expert noted the plan for the long term is to enter the segment of business and premium class housing in Ukraine.
“We also intend to develop business and premium class housing, as the company has gained successful experience in implementing such projects in Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and other CIS countries: we have built dozens of high-quality projects,” he stressed.
Caspian Service was founded in 2001. Its portfolio includes 71 projects in Azerbaijan, six in Kazakhstan, two in Georgia, one in Poland, eight in Ukraine. Since its foundation, the company has built and commissioned about 1.5 million square meters of facilities.
Arricano Real Estate Plc (Cyprus), the managing company and developer of a number of shopping and entertainment centers in Ukraine, received $8.56 million in net profit in the first half of 2019, which is 38% less than in the first half of 2018.
According to the company’s report, posted on the London Stock Exchange’s website, its revenue for January-June increased by 17%, to $17.3 million, while total profit decreased by 19.8%, to $17.74 million.
The fair value of the company’s portfolio increased by 9%, to $281.3 million.
According to Arricano, the growth of this indicator is associated with an increase in the value of the operating real estate portfolio by $15.6 million, as well as projects under development by $7.2 million.
Arricano’s net asset value in the first half of the year, according to its report, increased from $94 million to $111.8 million.
In addition, the developer notes an increase in the occupancy of its shopping centers from 99.7% to 99.9% and 82 new leasing contracts compared to 68 in the first half of 2018.
As reported, Arricano in 2018 received $38.1 million in net profit, which is 47.6% more than in 2017. Its revenue increased by 14.4% and amounted to $31.52 million.
