Discussions during the “Market Growth Projections” panel held at CEDER 2025 touched upon the role of financing in Romania’s market, revealing both signs of support from the banks, and areas needing structural change, with some investors highlighting specific practices they see as barriers to liquidity and growth.
Silviu Toma, Executive Director, Project and Corporate Structured Finance, at Raiffeisen Bank conveyed the bank’s long-standing dedication to the sector, stating, “we always supported [the] real estate market, and we are trying also to do this right now”. He indicated that the bank is actively adapting its approach, reviewing criteria and credit policies more often due to market volatility, unlike years past when policies remained static.
He affirmed, “the criteria are much more relaxed” today compared to 12 months ago. He believes the investment and development markets should be more substantial in Romania, stating, “we have potential, we have fundamentals”. Silviu Toma also detailed risks recently encountered, including hedging risk, the inability to transfer costs to tenants, leverage, and aggressive valuations. He mentioned efforts to “reduce the amortization of the loans” and be “much more flexible in terms of excess cash” to provide project buffers.
When it comes to asset classes, looking ahead, Raiffeisen is focusing on the retail, logistics, and industrial sectors, while being cautious about office due to occupancy uncertainty, and seeing potential in specialised real estate like clinics and residential for lease.
However, some of the investors taking part in the discussion voiced criticisms regarding financing practices. Joao Saracho de Almeida, Managing Director at Solida Capital Europe, found Romanian amortisation rates notably high, “completely unheard of in other countries”. He urged Romanian banks to “converge more with what is the practice in Germany, in Poland, in even Hungary”. He also felt local banks were not “really hungry for real estate business”, leading investors to use external banks with “non-standard conditions”. He concluded that “there should be a different proactivity from [the] financing sector.”
Vlad Dragoescu, Director, CEE Head of Portfolio Management at Revetas Capital, also noted that the banks’ preference to lend to the state due to the public deficit means “we won’t see liquidity debt in the market”, which might lead to a looming “financing wall”.
Anca Merdescu, Head of Investments at Square 7, part of M Core, summarized the tight relationship between financing and investment by saying: “financing, it’s a very important aspect of any investing, I would say. […] But, […] I think it’s a mix of collaboration between the banks and the investors in order to make this liquidity happen.”
