Member Article

Karanović & Nikolić Senior Associate, Ana Luković, visited the recently held 8^thInternational Bar Association's (IBA) Real Estate Conference in Copenhagen. As was the case during the previous editions of the conference, it provided a platform for around 150 attendees – hailing from all across the contemporary business spectrum – to communicate and exchange their views on various topics related to the field of real estate law. This year's main topics have dealt with a number of a regulatory updates including, but not limited to, the real estate tax reform in Austria, the restrictions for foreigners to acquire real estate in Switzerland, the acquisition of residential properties by foreign individuals in Turkey, as well as some issues from "across the pond", such as the foreign investment control in Canadian real estate, and the film location release agreements in the US.

Looking at some of the more specific learnings from the conference, it should be noted that investment fund representatives have noticed Western European countries such as Germany, France, and UK, to be falling behind in terms of new real estate investments, while the South and East Europe region was labelled as "booming", with Poland gaining the "European Dubai" moniker for leading the way in this regard. Furthermore, on a macro-level, 2015 has been described as the overall best year for real estate business in Europe since the 2008 crisis, which was followed by investment funds increasing their allocation of resources for real estate projects. However, on something of a negative note, it was pointed out that the area of property development specifically has not yet managed to recover from the recession. Finally, in terms of the European market, the moving of the representations and warranties insurance trend from US to Europe has been recognised by some of the panellists and attendees as the most probable large-scale activity going forward.