Real estate funding is back: 70m euros in three transactions

Banks have turned on the tap of funding for real estate projects again, with the development of two new malls - Electroputere Craiova and Colosseum Bucureşti - and the acquisition of the Praktiker store in Craiova being financed through bank loans worth a cumulated 70 million euros.

Consultants say small and medium-sized real estate funding - up to 40 million euros - can currently be negotiated with the local branches of foreign banks, while for higher amounts the approval of parent banks is necessary. The three real estate loans of the last few weeks have been granted by UniCredit (Electroputere), Bank of Cyprus (Colosseum) and Marfin Bank (Praktiker Craiova). Last year just as in 2009 banks had to allocate hundreds of millions of euros for non-performing loans. The "problematic" real estate projects are not completely out of the woods yet, but some banks say they now stand a good chance of rebalancing their portfolio.