Year opens with massive discounts on real-estate property seized by banks in Romania

The prices of real-estate properties seized by banks on account of owners’ failure to pay loan installments have dropped as much as 25 percent beginning of 2013, according to a press release of Executari.com, a forced execution web portal in Romania. In fact, this appears to be the best season for prospective bidders to get their hands on a studio for as little as EUR 7,000 on the average and on a two room apartment for some EUR 20,000, according to the portal’s estimates. Moreover, the cheapest studio in Romania is on sale for a little over EUR 2,000. “All interested buyers have already learnt that, if the auctioned asset is not sold during the first round of bidding, its price will have to drop by 25 percent,” according to Elena Puica, Commercial Manager of Executari.com. “Therefore, in 90 percent of cases, no one will make any offer during the first round of bidding for forcefully executed assets, which forces banks to start the second round of bidding at 75 percent of the initially assessed price.” With a quarter of the initially announced price off, buyers are looking for instance, at a EUR 8,460 price (VAT excluded) for a 16.77 square meter studio with a central location in Bucharest. Similar properties in Arad, Vaslui or Bacau have prices ranging from EUR 7,500 to EUR 8,850 (VAT excluded). With two room apartments, prospective bidders are looking at a price range from EUR 14,400 for 50 square meters in Videle (Teleorman county) to EUR 20,400 for 48 square meters in Vatra Dornei (Suceava county). In Bucharest, there are tens of such properties ready to be sold. One offer places a 35 square meter apartment in sector 5 at EUR 21,750 while 3 square meters more and a location in sector 4 raise a second two room apartment’s worth to EUR 25,000. The discounted offer also includes three room apartments, with EUR 27,000 for 81 square meters in Dambovita county and a little over EUR 20,000 for 83 square meters in Giurgiu county. Ioana Jelea (ioana.jelea@romania-insider.com) (photo source: Photoxpress.com)