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New Rentals in Old Europe
Date: 05/08/2008
You'll find plenty of opportunities for the short-term rental market in Slovakia's capital.
Dear International Living Reader,
My Bratislava home is a short-term rental: a third-floor studio on Rajska Street. This is city center, District 1--but not the historic center. The studio is adequate for minimalists, but not luxurious. The building’s ground-floor glass panel frontage is cracked and grimy. Its elevator (installed in 1945) has already broken down twice. And this costs me an overpriced $85 per night.
Thursday, May 8, 2008
Bratislava, Slovakia
Dear International Living Reader,
My Bratislava home is a short-term rental: a third-floor studio on Rajska Street. This is city center, District 1--but not the historic center. The studio is adequate for minimalists, but not luxurious. The building’s ground-floor glass panel frontage is cracked and grimy. Its elevator (installed in 1945) has already broken down twice. And this costs me an overpriced $85 per night.
The opera and ballet season is underway, golden forsythia blooms in parks, but March snow flurries don’t make for idyllic Danube pleasure cruises. Even so, finding reasonably-priced accommodation in Slovakia’s capital wasn’t easy. Other agency apartments were fully booked. There’s no oversupply of tourist rentals--so the right property could be a goldmine. City average for buyers is $2,380 per square meter.
Bratislava’s growing middle-class want to buy--and mortgages aren’t hard to get. In District 1, long-term rentals for one-bedroom apartments start at around $1,050 monthly, but can be over $1,500. Main takers are foreigners, not middle-class locals.
Oddly, Bratislava’s Old Town is also home to the not-so-well-off. If buying, beware of sitting tenants. Pensioners inhabit around 3,000 apartments: they had nowhere to go when communism fell and property rights were restored. Their rents remain regulated. The Slovak Spectator says a rent-controlled 140-square-meter apartment in more upscale areas nets $151 a month. The real monthly market value for large apartments is $1,017.
Mario Antalik of R & V Realitna is scathing about UK companies selling some new developments in Bratislava’s outer suburbs to “investors”. They often promise high rental yields along with capital appreciation. But some run-down projects are on the market--and most locals spurn cheaply-built concrete rubbish just because it’s new. The big desire is for brick.
In Mr Antalik’s words: ‘’there’s a lot to rent that’s not rentable.’’ Tourists certainly don’t yearn to stay in the suburbs. He says renovating a 70-square-meter apartment costs $19,000 to $23,700. Converting to tourist standards generally means installing radiators, a new boiler for hot water supply, new kitchen, bathroom and toilet, plus parquet flooring.
Steenie Harvey,
Roving Europe Editor, International Living
Editor’s Note: Steenie has much more to tell you about investing and living in Slovakia and will spill all in the upcoming issues of International Living magazine. If you are not yet a subscriber you can sign-up today to gain instant access.
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