Constant change along the Bosporus

Taking a look at the big country along the Bosporus is always worth it. Here are the hard facts: According to the Turkish Council of Shopping Centers (AYD), the sales index increased by 14.1% Y-o-Y in February 2018 being above the inflation rate of 10.26%. However, it decreased by 13.9% versus January 2018 mainly driven by the ending of the discount period. Meanwhile, a Y-o-Y footfall decrease of 6.1% was recorded.

The experts of Cushman & Wakefield show in their “Turkey – Retail Market Snapshot“ that retailer activity remained relatively low in the first quarter as a result of another exchange rate hike. Most retailers expand more cautiously again after a reasonably active second half of 2017.

Nevertheless, there were several openings in the first quarter of 2018 and quite a few “new additions”:

MediaMarkt continued increasing its market share by opening stores while Magnum opened a concept coffee shop on Bagdat street.

Pizza Hut started opening concept stores whereas rival Domino’s opened its first shopping center store in Forum Istanbul.

Lego opened its first mono-brand store in Kanyon. Buuday, a brand under the umbrella of Backhaus, has increased its store portfolio to three, all on the Asian side of Istanbul.

Tante Roza opened a multi-story concept store on Bagdat street. On the other hand, Shumix continues closing stores while Crate and Barrel is preparing its exit from Turkey.

Three big openings

At first, the malls: 150,000 sq m of new shopping-center-supply entered the Turkish market in the first quarter of 2018; namely IstMarina (70,000 sq m), Home City (50,000 sq m) in Istanbul and Adiyaman Park (30,000 sq m) in Adiyaman.

Investment transactions in the shopping center market in Turkey have accelerated in the first quarter of 2018 with Aksistem’s acquisition of Kipa Cerkezkoy for approximately TL44 million, the disposal of Resolute Asset Management’s NeoPlus Outlet Centre in Eskisehir to Nata Holding, Gulaylar Group’s acquisition of CarrefourSA Icerenkoy from Bainbridge, Bayrampasa CarrefourSA’s disposal to Re-Pie Real Estate for TL145 million and NOT Real Estate’s acquisition of CarrefourSA in Kocaeli.

Outlook

The acceleration in the investment market signals that further consolidation in the shopping center market can be expected. Smaller deals of up to USD100 million especially in secondary cities in Anatolia will be primary targets, according to the experts of Cushman & Wakefield.

While retailers remain under pressure from rising exchange rates smaller shopping center owners are increasingly looking to exit as a result of increasing rental discounts. This on the other hand has resulted in lower price expectations which put opportunistic buyers on the map.

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