BNPPRE Dashboards

Office market Q3 2024

Despite the absence of an economic tailwind, the German office markets remain in good shape overall at the end of the third quarter of 2024. After three quarters, take-up totalled around 1.95 million m², up almost 4% on the previous year (1.88 million m²). Although letting activity in the office markets of Berlin, Düsseldorf, Essen, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Cologne, Leipzig and Munich is still below average, some markets are sending out strong signals of stabilisation and the first signs of a catch-up trend. In the fourth quarter, we also expect the successful signing of some signalling large-volume rental contracts, although their impact is unlikely to be sufficient to lift the market as a whole to a completely new level. However, we expect take-up to exceed the previous year's level. While the vacancy rate is likely to have almost reached its cyclical high, the growth trend in prime rents will continue as before.

Commercial investment market Q3 2024

In the first three quarters, turnover on the German investment markets was noticeably higher than in the same period of the previous year. Total turnover with commercial real estate amounted to a good €17.9 billion by the end of September 2024. This corresponds to a year-on-year increase of around 15%. The upward trend already observed in the first half of the year has therefore continued. At just under 800, the number of registered sales nationwide is also around a fifth higher than in 2023. This overall positive development is particularly remarkable when you consider that the markets are still experiencing headwinds from the economy. The fact that investors are nevertheless visibly investing more indicates that they have a better assessment of Germany's long-term prospects than the economic forcasts - even if there are considerable differences in the medium-term outlook for the individual asset classes. From today's perspective, the overall analysis of these different influencing factors suggests that the moderate upward trend of the current year will continue, even if a sharp rise in transaction volumes towards the long-term average is likely to take a little longer.

The share of certified green buildings within the commercial investment volume (excluding portfolios) remains at a very high level, even in a challenging market environment. After the top figure of just under 31% in 2022, around 27% was achieved in 2023. This is the second-highest share in the last 10 years and confirms the importance of green investments. While the EU Taxonomy mainly concerned companies in the real estate sector that wanted to place funds on the capital market, it is now affecting more and more market participants. Accordingly, sustainability regulations are becoming increasingly important for investors and buyers across the board, while at the same time occupiers (tenants and leaseholders) must now also take taxonomy criteria into account in their corporate governance. Against this backdrop, proactive management will remain the order of the day in 2024.

Logistics market Q3 2024

With take-up of almost 4 million m² in the first three quarters, the nationwide logistics market was unable to keep pace with its long-term average of around 5 million m² (-22%), but after a subdued start to the year there has been a noticeable market upturn for some months now, which is reflected in increased demand and rising take-up. This is a pleasing result in view of the continuing challenging economic conditions. Although logistics space take-up fell by around 12% compared to the same period last year, a positive trend has been observed since the weak first quarter. It is also particularly noteworthy that the number of registered contracts has risen noticeably over the course of the year and that the third quarter has approached the average of the past five years. In order to achieve a higher take-up result, there is currently a lack of large-scale agreements above the 20,000 m² mark, of which there were significantly more in previous years. After the strong growth in rents of recent years continued only marginally in the first three quarters, prime rents remained stable in the third quarter.

Retail market Q3 2024

The nationwide retail market can look back on dynamic letting activity in the first three quarters: with almost 650 lettings and openings registered in the first nine months of the current year, almost 10 % more contracts were signed than at the end of the third quarter of 2023. The fact that take-up was at the same time lower than in the same period of the previous year is primarily due to the very large-scale contracts signed by Modehaus Aachener in 2023. In total, the related rental agreements of the Modehaus Aachener, most of which were concluded in former Galeria shops, accounted for a volume of around 100,000 m². In the meantime, however, these shops have already closed again or are on the verge of closing and some have already been re-let. If these contracts are consequently not taken into account in the very high result for the first three quarters of 2023 (around 450,000 m²), the current take-up of a good 360,000 m² would even be slightly above the previous year's result (around 350,000 m² excluding Modehaus Aachener).

Residential Dashboard 2023

The course of 2022 so far has been characterised by different, very dynamic developments. On the one hand, with the ongoing transition of the Corona pandemic into an endemic, the usual movement is slowly returning to society and the housing markets. On the other hand, the Russian war of aggression and the strong increase in inflation created a new challenging market environment. Rising SWAP rates and worsening financing conditions have caused an overall slowdown in market dynamics. Overall, the housing markets are thus in a phase of consolidation. On average, rents and prices are currently stabilising. However, there are clear local differences.

Residential rental & purchase price navigator

The residential markets of the most popular metropolises in Germany have been dominated by rising rental and purchase prices for years. But what is the situation in the rest of the country? BNPPRE investigated this question and analyzed all 108 independent cities in Germany. With the BNPPRE Residential Navigator, which is updated every six months, you can make further progress through the numerous residential markets and keep an eye on rental and purchase price developments (for condominiums) in the new builds and existing stock as well as other key figures.

Hotel Dashboard H1 2024

In the first half of 2024, an investment volume of €545 million was registered with hotel transactions. Although the long-term average was once again clearly missed (-58% resp. 10-year average: €1.3 billion), this represents an increase of 40% compared to the weak H1 result of the previous year. The overall positive trend towards a further market upturn and an acceleration in transaction activity is underlined in a direct quarter-on-quarter comparison by an increase in the investment volume of almost a third and a doubling of the number of transactions to around 20 in the second quarter. Nevertheless, the investment volume remains at a significantly lower level than in previous years.

The Hotel Dashboard from BNP Paribas Real Estate provides an overview of the development of hotel investment and performance indicators in the various top markets in Germany.

BNPPRE Tourism analyser

On the German hotel market, after the impactful Corona years of 2020 and 2021, all key performance indicators suggest that the recovery of tourism in Germany has gained significant momentum, especially since summer 2022. With a total of around 349 million overnight stays between January and the end of September, the figures for 2021 as a whole (around 310 million guests) had already been outperformed by almost 13% before the start of the fourth quarter. On a monthly basis, the number of overnight stays has been on a par with the level of 2019 since August due to the renewed demand impulses in city and business tourism as well as among guests from abroad. An analysis by BNP Paribas Real Estate on the most important developments and trends in the German hotel market shows how the Corona crisis has affected the general conditions in the hospitality industry and influenced travel behaviour in Germany.