Bucharest’s Magheru Boulevard rental fees up 13% year-on-year

 At the end of the first half of 2008, rental fees on this main artery amounted to some €1,500 per sqm annually, more than rents on Stockholm’s most expensive street, Biblioteksgatan (€1,419 per sqm per year) or Lisbon’s Chiado (€1,200 per sqm per year). Rent for commercial space on Magheru Boulevard rose 13.6 percent compared to H1 2007. Most areas included in the JLL survey registered higher rental fees year-on-year. “In the 12 months since the financial crisis began, almost 70 percent of markets taken into account registered increases in rental fees,” the survey shows. Paris ranks first in the JLL study, with rental fees amounting to an average €7,360 per sqm per year on the Champs Elysees. Moscow’s Stoleshnikov Lane ranks second, at €7,035 per sqm per year, followed by London’s New Bond Street, with annual rental fees of €6,762 per sqm. Regionally, rents on Bucharest’s Magheru Boulevard are exceeded only by Kiev’s Kreshchatik Street, Na Prikope street in Prague, and Vaci Street in Budapest. The study also considered rental fees in other major cities in Romania. Outside Bucharest, the most expensive streets, located in the city of Cluj-Napoca, are Eroilor Boulevard and Ferdinand Street, with annual rental fees of up to €960 per sqm. Rental fees on Brasov’s Republicii Street and Constanta’s Tomis Boulevard average €720 per sqm per year. JLL surveyed 100 streets in major European cities, in terms of annual rental fees. (A.U.)