"Balkans Real Estate" to invest 1 billion EUR in real estates in Serbia and in region within next five years

Company "Balkans Real Estate" announced that it planned to invest up to 1 billion EUR in real estates in Serbia and in the region within the next five years.

The Deputy Executive Director of "Balkans Real Estate", Radmila Nikolić, said that the company’s investments in 2008 had amounted to 200m EUR.

- Construction of 190,000 square meters is underway, while the projects for development of total of 500,000 square meters are in the pipeline – said Nikolić.

Nikolić said that the strategy of US investment bank "Merrill Lynch" was that "Balkans Real Estate", the joint venture with "MPC holding", should be the platform for regional operations.

She specified that the reorganization of "MPC Properties" into "Balkans Real Estate" had been completed on December 22, 2008.

The focus of "Balkans Real Estate", as she explained, is on the investments in shopping centers at first-class locations in all cities of former Yugoslavia.

- We have already bought such locations in two cities – said Nikolić, but she did not reveal the names of the cities or the countries.

- Since "Balkans Real Estate" deals with investments and project development, and not management, the partner in that segment is company ECE, which deals with shopping center management – said the Deputy Executive Director of the company.

According to her words, ECE runs over 100 shopping centers in Europe, and the partnership with that company will enable reaching of international standards of services.

"Balkans Real Estate" is currently building Trade center "Ušće" in Belgrade, worth 150m EUR, which should be opened on March 31, 2009, while the construction of about 90,000 square meters of office space at 3 ha of land near Autokomanda is in the pipeline.

In January 2008, US bank "Merrill Lynch" became the owner of 25% of capital of "MPC Properties", which operated within "MPC holding", owned by Serbian businessman Petar Matić.