UniCredit bank will relocate its headquarters to an office building in northern Bucharest next year with the rental deal being on the biggest on the local market this year.
"It is about 8,000 square metres of office space, warehouses and other administrative space, with a bank branch set to operate on the ground level of the building," says Bogdan Georgescu, managing director of the local Colliers International office, the company that brokered the deal.
He did not care to provide details about the total value of the transaction but considering the average monthly price and average duration of the leases, this could be somewhere in the neighbourhood of 5 million euros.
The local branch of the Italian financial group will relocate its headquarters to the building located in close proximity to the Herastrau Lake next year.
"This move was necessary because we needed the space," stated Rasvan Radu, the executive chairman of UniCredit Romania.
The bank has been previously headquartered in a building close to the Chamber of Commerce of Bucharest, where it had Societatea de Investitii Financiare (Financial Investment Company - SIF) Muntenia as neighbour.
The building in northern Bucharest that will accommodate UniCredit is structured on six levels (underground, ground floor and four storeys).
The average surface area per level is approximately 1,200 square metres, according to Colliers officials. The building is held by Niro Group, which is involved in other businesses on the real estate market, such as a residential project under development, whose value is estimated at 50 million euros.
UniCredit Romania has been operating on the Romanian market since 1997.
The bank will be involved in a merger process with HVB-Tiriac next year, after its main shareholder, Italian UniCredito Group merged with German HVB Group.
"By moving to the new location we will be closer to HVB," Radu added.
The headquarters of HVB Bank are located in Charles de Gaulle Plaza, a building close the Charles de Gaulle Square, in northern Bucharest.
Banks have been some of the main customers of the office buildings delivered onto the local market over the last few years.
One of the first major deals that involved a relocation of a bank operating on the domestic market was the sale of the BRD Tower.
In 2003, French group Vinci completed construction of the tallest building in Piata Victoriei, whose surface area reaches over 21,000 square metres, which it sold to BRD Societe Generale.
In the absence of other real estate projects to buy, the other banking groups operating in Romania went for rental of existing locations or pre-renting space that was to be delivered. ionut.bonoiu@zf.ro
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