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February 2014 Newsletter

03/03/2014

The goal of our newsletter is to keep you abreast of recent legal and tax developments in the various areas where our firm has recognised expertise. 

Editorial

Europe, a single property market? Not really…
From 11 to 14 March 2014, the 25th MIPIM, the international real estate trade fair, will take place in Cannes. One can expect investor sentiment to be better this year as markets continue to recover.

No doubt this evolution will not be the same everywhere. If Germany fares well, the situation remains much gloomier in the Netherlands; if Poland ‘works’ well, Hungary remains a globally depressed market.

The same holds true for the different asset classes: offices, retail, warehouses and residential; in the same geographical market, situations often differ significantly from one class to the other.

The European real estate market thus remains highly fragmented economically, just as it is legally fragmented, despite the harmonization process at work in certain areas of law, such as environmental law. This reality, which may seem evident to many, is nevertheless good to be reminded of regularly, given that each recovery period of a market seems to generate its fair share of nasty surprises owing to the new entrants this attracts.

At CMS, we try to deliver solutions for this risk through our Real Estate Practice Area Group, which brings together specialist property lawyers from our 56 offices in Europe and beyond.

Come and meet them in Cannes next month!

Bruno Duquesne
Head of Real Estate

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