A Polish developer will build almost 6,000. apartments for rent

Vantage Development is a company originating from Wrocław and strongly associated with this city. It began operating in the capital of Lower Silesia in the first decade of the 21st century. In March 2020, the company was bought by the German developer TAG Immobilien, which focuses on corporate rental.

Renting apartments from a company – what does it involve?

It involves the company preparing several dozen apartments in a unified standard and signing contracts with tenants. Customers do not rent an apartment from a private person, but from a company that has dozens, and sometimes hundreds of buildings in its portfolio. This form of leasing appeared in Poland a few years ago and is available in the largest cities. In practice, it looks like this: funds – because they are the ones who most often finance the investment – build or buy an existing block or even an entire housing estate, arrange and manage all the apartments there.

In 2021, the Nordic fund NREP bought over 1,000 apartments in Warsaw in one go. In 2024, the Dutch Van der Vorm group purchased a ready-made building with 119 apartments in Warsaw in the Praga Południe district. It is foreign groups – with money and knowledge about this type of investment – who most often spend money on apartments for rent.

– Funds are most often interested in a package purchase of some of the premises in an investment or the entire takeover of the project. What also matters is the location of the investment and its design – of course, as attractive as possible for the future group of tenants – explains Béranger Dumont, general director of BPI Real Estate Poland.

Do funds drive up real estate prices?

In Poland, premises intended for corporate rental have a small share in the real estate market and, as we said, only apply to large cities. However, over time, their share may increase, which will be facilitated by the increase in real estate costs. If it turns out that the group of individual customers who are able to pay PLN 14,000 will shrink. PLN per square meter of an apartment in Warsaw, Krakow or Gdańsk (and these are now average prices in these cities and on the outskirts), developers will smile more broadly at foreign funds for which paying several million zlotys for a multi-family building is not a challenge.

For some developers, close cooperation with funds is a chance to survive in more difficult times. Besides, the fund is a good customer: although it should be offered a lower price per meter because it buys in bulk, the entire block is sold at once. The developer does not have to organize a sales office, an advertising campaign, an “open house”, wait for individual customers to receive a loan… The sale takes place quickly and according to an established pattern.

Today, corporate leasing is more of a curiosity than a real force, but this may change in the future. And this will not necessarily be good for the rental market, as evidenced by the example of countries where funds have been the main owners of apartments for years. In 2021, Berlin, on the occasion of the Bundestag elections, a referendum was held on the expropriation (for compensation) of the property of private companies owning apartments for rent in the city. 56 percent of Berliners supported the takeover of property.

What did funds do to deserve such hostility? Residents of the German capital believe that the mass purchases of entire buildings by large companies have driven up the prices of apartment rentals by institutional owners. The problem is even more important because 85 percent of Berlin's inhabitants live in rented accommodation.

The Dutch also have problems with the availability and prices of apartments. In September 2021, they protested against high prices and lack of premises. They blame investors, among others, for driving up prices.

The Vantage Group has the conditions to build almost 6,000. apartments

Returning to the Vantage Group: it currently has over 2,500 apartments for rent throughout Poland. It has premises in Wrocław, Poznań and Łódź, in a total of 12 investments. In addition, another 1,200 premises are under construction for rent in the cities where the Group operates, but also in new markets – including: in Tricity. TAG Group – together with Vantage – offers a total of over 87,000 apartments for rent in Europe.

– The company's land bank allows for the construction of approximately 5,700 apartments. We operate in Warsaw, Wrocław, Tricity, Poznań and Łódź. We already have 7 investments for rent in Wrocław. Our PRS offer is systematically growing and we plan to expand it to additional cities in Poland – said Oscar Kazanelson, chairman of the supervisory board of Robyg and Vantage.