There's rising interest in PPP-driven urban regeneration

This interview was first published in Property Forum's annual listing of "The 50 most influential people in Romania's real estate market”.

Which specific sectors defined CMS's real estate practice throughout 2025?

CMS's real estate practice in 2025 was shaped by a strong pipeline of retail and industrial transactions, including portfolio acquisitions, as well as build-to-suit and development projects mostly outside Bucharest. 

From the second half of the year, office deals also returned, particularly in relation to well-positioned, single-asset transactions. In parallel, we assisted on a significant number of renewables projects, including development mandates, divestments, and renewables financing transactions, where land structuring, zoning, and permitting work are key to securing solid bankable projects.
We were closely involved in complex, multi-layered projects, combining land acquisition and development structuring, where aligning stakeholders and transaction parameters was essential to getting deals signed and closed. The negotiation of products such as title insurance and warranty and indemnity (W&I) policies to protect both sellers and buyers has become more frequent in our transactions, which is another indication that the Romanian real estate market is maturing. 

Our leasing activity remained constant, as we assisted large US, European, and Israeli occupiers to negotiate office and retail leases for thousands of square metres in Bucharest and major cities.

Looking ahead to 2026, do you anticipate a surge in new institutional capital entering Romania, or will strategic consolidations continue to lead the market?

Looking ahead to 2026, the volume of new institutional capital entering Romania will remain closely linked to broader country perception, including macroeconomic stability, political predictability, and the consistency of regulatory and administrative practice. While strategic consolidations are likely to continue to drive a large part of transaction activity in the short term, attracting fresh institutional capital will require a sustained, collective effort—from public authorities, market participants, and advisors alike—to position Romania more competitively in the region alongside countries like Poland or the Czech Republic.

Romania has a strategic opportunity to play a more active role in the region, including as a logistics, infrastructure, and production hub in the context of Ukraine's post-war reconstruction. If approached in a consistent manner, this could support new capital entries into logistics, industrial, defence-adjacent, and infrastructure-linked real estate sectors, rather than relying solely on consolidation-driven growth. Separately, we see growing interest in PPP-type or concession-based structures for urban regeneration and mixed-use projects, especially where public land or public functions are involved.

These projects remain difficult to structure under the current legal framework, which does not fully accommodate integrated developments combining public infrastructure with private commercial components. In practice, this often leads to reliance on concession-based or hybrid solutions, negotiated on a case-by-case basis, increasing complexity, timing risk, and legal uncertainty. The long-term development of our cities would be materially enhanced by a more robust and clearly articulated framework designed to facilitate effective public-private collaboration on major urban regeneration initiatives. 

Similar to the accelerated processes for renewables projects, the market may welcome more expedited and coordinated mechanisms for large commercial projects with public interest elements, based on objective criteria and providing for maximum review deadlines.

As developers increasingly target secondary and tertiary cities, how is CMS supporting clients in navigating the varying legal and administrative landscapes outside Bucharest?

Over the past two to three years, CMS has been extensively supporting clients investing in and developing in Romania's secondary and tertiary cities. Much of this activity responds to a clear market need, particularly for well-structured retail schemes in cities where consumer demand has long been underserved. While these locations can appear administratively simpler—as local authorities are often proactive and keen to stimulate growth—we regularly see complex legal and regulatory challenges in practice.

We dedicate significant time to educating local authorities on institutional requirements while bridging the gap between local delivery and investor expectations. Our role involves providing the necessary structuring to ensure projects become investment-ready despite regional variations in practice.

With traditional investors pivoting towards green energy, how is the legal framework evolving to facilitate these complex, cross-sector infrastructure and land deals?

In our practice, many traditional real estate investors diversify beyond core property assets, both by developing standalone renewable projects and by integrating rooftop solar and other energy solutions into their existing portfolios. This is largely driven by energy price instability and long-term operating cost considerations. From a legal perspective, this has accelerated the need for frameworks that can handle cross-sector transactions at the intersection of real estate, energy, and infrastructure.

In practice, this means increased use of hybrid deal structures combining land rights, grid-connection arrangements, permitting under both construction and energy regimes, and more complex project-level or portfolio-level financing. While the legal framework is evolving, there are still grey areas regarding matters like the registration of leases on the rooftops of commercial buildings with multiple owners. Tacit approval mechanisms in certain permitting workstreams can support transaction timelines, but these fast-track procedures tend to shift more regulatory risk onto developers, who must perform in-depth self-assessments. In financing scenarios, this can raise bankability concerns if lenders are cautious where permits have not been expressly confirmed by the issuing authority.

At the same time, changes such as the recent narrowing of transactions subject to mandatory FDI approval—particularly the exemption of smaller-ticket deals, such as many land acquisitions below the €5 million threshold—have the potential to materially streamline real estate transactions. This may reduce timing uncertainty and execution risk for sponsors and investors, especially in early-stage development and land consolidation strategies.