Svoboda & Williams Partner of the Real Estate Market Autumn 2019 Conference

During the course of the conference, panelists discussed the latest topics that the Czech real estate market has been abuzz with. David Kužela from Ernst & Young considered the potential of rental housing projects in the Czech Republic, which are hampered by not being able to deduct VAT and therefore their development has been rather slow. Pavel Sovička, director of Panattoni Europe, spoke about the lack of infrastructure that forces foreign companies to invest instead in neighboring countries. He agreed with Milan Kratina from the Accolade company that investment into infrastructure is crucial for the economic development of the country and that the Czech Republic is lagging behind its neighbors in this area.

There was an interesting debate among the developers and municipal representatives during the panel on public space and participation. Marcel Soural from Trigema pointed out that developers are trying to meet residents’ demands when realizing their new projects, but that they need more support from politicians at the local level and from civil servants.

During the panel on apartments and housing not only in Prague, Petr Michálek, CEO of Skanska Reality, presented a new concept of prefabricated housing that will speed up construction and open the door to people who currently can’t afford to own housing. The owner of the Svoboda & Williams real estate agency, Prokop Svoboda, focused on the other end of the residential housing spectrum, i.e. the premium segment, and more specifically on current premium property prices. According to numerous newspaper articles, it would seem that the average price of an apartment in Prague has risen to the average price of a premium property. However, a closer look at the numbers and prices based on real estate transactions shows that the difference between the two segments continues to be around 40%. Only in Prague 1 and 2 are the averages similar, since both municipal districts are premium locations.