Polish residential property market news Q3 2023

For many industries, the holiday months and September are the dead season, but not for residential properties. It was a very intense time for both the rental and sales markets.

The rental market usually records high activity during this period, one of the highest levels of the year. The demand was high and the apartments or rooms we had on offer quickly found new tenants, and the rents we managed to negotiate were often above market level. We are closing this season again with very good results.

It is worth mentioning here that the growing supply of apartments for rent, including the growing institutional rental sector (PRS) in Poland, makes Polish tenants more demanding as to the standard and equipment, and the price-quality ratio plays an increasingly important role. A very interesting look at the prospects for the rental market in Poland is presented by the ThinkCo. report, in which we participated as rental market experts. The report can be downloaded for free.

After a downtime on the apartment sales market, the long-awaited revival finally came, caused by the government program “First Apartment”. The program was launched in July and offers a lower, only 2%, interest rate on a mortgage loan for the purchase of a first apartment or house. Additionally, the government has gone even further towards buyers of their first apartment by exempting them from the fee when purchasing real estate on the secondary market (fee is 2% of the transaction value). Recent base interest rate decreases (from 6.75% to 5.75%) also support buyers.

On the other hand, we have investors whom the government is trying to discourage from investing and is introducing a higher purchase tax. – 6% instead of 2%. It will be paid by people purchasing the sixth and subsequent apartments (or shares) in one land property.

The Polish residential market is currently at an interesting point in its development. On the one hand, we have Poles striving for ownership and the government supporting these aspirations and trying to limit the activities of investors. On the other side, there is a dynamically developing rental sector and the economic necessity to rent, because apartment prices are constantly rising, making the purchase of an apartment less affordable even with the help of government programs.