Poland's apartment prices continue to fall

I would like to hear more people to try and attempt answering the above question. I've thrown in my view numerous time. In Ireland alone between 2004-07, 7billion was sent back home mainly for the purchase of property.

The property buying section of the population is basically equal to the age group that are emigrating, 7 million. Subtract the amount abroad , the amount who aren't(abroad) and unemployed or who are on minimum wage(2 euro Hour).

You will find that Poles abroad are the main reason for pushing up the prices.

In other former Eastern Blocks like Czech republic were wages are higher and property prices are significantly lower,the only answer for this is that Czechs are staying at home and prices reflect that.

To say the Poles abroad are earning very little, is nonsense, especially during the 2004-07 period, were people on buildings were taking home 1000 euros a week,,ten time the wage of unskilled work in Poland. I knew Poles back home who earned more in 3 months in Ireland than 12 months in Poland.

People on here are convinced that the Pole abroad are not the reason for the 300% rise in property prices, but Polish wages since 2004?? how much did they go up....how could low interest rates encourage someone on 130 euro a week in Poland take out a mortgage of 75000 euro,,it doesn't add up.

@Milky
Thank you for that interesting post. I am beginning to think of no other reason than what you suggested. If the Polish banks are not giving mortgages out easily, then yours must be the correct conclusion.

If that's where your imagination leads you then that's your business, not mine- keep me out of it.


yeah mostly that is true...to judge is merely to decide on how to think about something, it's a rather essential process in this life. Maybe you meant to say people like to judge others negatively, I don't know and can only comment on what you did write.

But yeah, I think you're right- I've got the capitalist blues. Lately I've been getting down about a system that so effectively rewards greed and competition over cooperation:(

It seems all it takes is one person to screw things up by thinking "just a little more for me" and then the domino effect begins:(

Maybe it's just people's greed that gets me down.

What this does tell me about this thread is that people DO see flats and property as investments in parts of Poland and demand DOES seem to be at least holding in much of Poland. This also indicates that what happened in parts of Europe and North America may also happen in the future, i.e. a market with increasing speculation seems like a market more likely to crash at some point.

Higher interest rates expected to drive real estate prices down
The recent 0.25 percentage point increase in interest rates may mean a slowdown in
lending. That in turn will cause the values of homes and apartments to go down,
analysts, banking experts and developers say. The drop in real estate values may reach
4-10 percent in the next two years, they estimate. Since 2008, i.e. since the collapse of
Lehman Brothers, which affected the real estate sector, the prices of homes and
apartments in the largest 15 cities have dropped by over 14 percent, and in the last 12
months, as analysts from Open Finance point out - by 9.4 percent.
(Dziennik Gazeta Prawna, p.5) AS

Without wanting to criticise anyone in particular but 2000PLN for 25m2 IS excessive regardless whether it's in Warsaw or Walsall. Going back to my original question, who determines what is fair market value? It's very easy to say "the market" but there are many factors that affect the market value. Supply and demand is one thing, excess demand over supply, but surely property speculators play a major part in this. Like milky says, people are buying to rent to others, it drove the price of property and rents up in the UK so it's obvious it will do the same in Poland therefore people do affect that market. Also the lack of decent, affordable social housing forces people into the private rented sector so people are forced into paying over inflated prices for property.

There is a severe shortage of property in Poland, and not very much new stuff has been built. Its a hang over from the communist era.


Property prices are falling because banks are not giving mortgages. I think Milky's theory of overseas working keeping price high is overstated, I know several people who have bought recently with money they have saved or their parents give them. Parents are in a position of owning their homes (free/cheap in the communist era) and having highish wages.


You have just spouted urban legend quite describing the UK not Poland. I think the average Pole is not the slightest bit interested in 'social housing' but wants to buy so he can own and profit on capital appreciation or rent it out to live off some other ******.

Rents, in Krakow at least, in no way reflect the cost of property. Private renting is cheap and buying to let here doesn't make any sense as an investment.

yes, but this is partly because a lot of purchasing was done with cash earned abroad, so the bank didn't need to fork out money or as much money.


and so do I,but what else could explain the 200-300% jump in prices 2004-07,at the same time as EU enlargement...Is there another argument to replace mine.

To be fair, one doesn't have to replace your idea with another one but simply cast enough doubt on it being the sole explanation. There may be different columns and periods that we could draw from to piece together how the current market came into being.

Do you know anything about real estate? Surely you would agree that a condo in central London is more expensive than a condo that requires a 40 minute drive to get to. How about a rental next to a Uni in central London- cheaper or more expensive than a rental in the suburbs? The demand in the area where we want to buy is driven up by the students and for the fact that Powisle is an established area close to the Wisla with a lot of green space and pre war buildings.

So you think if we buy this flat, renovate it totally then rent it for 2000 pln per month is too much. So should I just charge half that because you think the market is not fair?

Any idea how much a rental in Vancouver, New York, Moscow, Paris etc etc go for? That is the way the real estate game goes. I can't change it.

Just because something is happening in the UK DOES NOT mean it will happen in Poland. The UK got hit hard with the recession- Poland...barely a scratch. Canada hardly felt a bump except for the American manufacturers that were there where as the US got knocked over. It is not universal

Milky doesn't know anything about real estate his responses are what he wants and thinks will happen not what actually is happening.

Here is something. The residential market is saturated with new construction homes. The buyer now has a choice and therefore developers are having to lower prices and offer "perks". In Warsaw there are flats that go for 30,000, 15,000 per m2 in high end buildings in the city centre or down to less that 5,000 in the Wilanow area.

if making money out of homes and other people's insecurity and poverty is your thing, fine.
Bragging about it, and suggesting that this makes you superior to others, is something else.

Maybe maybe not. the fact remains that millions of poles were given property cheaply and now are mortgage free and can afford to save of give their children money for property. Its irrelevant

to be honest.


Most students I know live on less than 1000 per month and pay rent of about 500. Never heard of any having anything like 2000 to live on. Student nurses straight out of school earn 2300 a month.

I saw a large 2 bed apartment in the Krakow old town for about 2500 per month.

So if you can get 2000 from students, well good luck to you.

oh for feck sake.

I don't even own the place yet.

I was never bragging about it. All I was saying from the beginning is that we are looking at buying property in Powisle and the prices have not dropped at all in this area. It is not rocket science and if you know anything at all about real estate then perhaps you would have something interesting to add. The fact is in older more established areas of Warsaw the prices have not dropped if you want to buy in a pre war building.

In any part of the world in any city -older areas that are established and have limited potential growth and established green space are more expensive than the suburbs of any city in any country in the entire world.


that is complete and utter garbage. The majority of these flats if you would care to check for yourself on oferty.net are in a state of disrepair and are empty.

The fact is the price of 2000 pln is the existing market value for a bachelor apartment in Powisle. Charging more would be stupid and so would charging less. Particularly if we plan to completely gut the place and buy all new furniture. And two people would probably live in it. and if we can't get 2000 per month than we will charge less. big freaking deal.

What- I charge this price and people have to rent it? Nobody is forcing anybody to rent anything. But I am willing to bet that more people would want to live in a nice building with new furniture and new fit out over a communist era block that stinks with old furniture -and both are the same price.

f*cking save your criticism for some greedy slum lord that takes advantage of students and foreigners. Don't crap on me because I want to buy an old flat, fix it up and rent it for a price that is established by the market. for christ sake it is not like there are no places to rent.

I lived in a student area in Canada- I know exactly what it is like and it is the same all over the world. save your criticism for somebody that deserves it.

and just for reference the above are located in the area I am talking about. So after gas/electricity it will be about 2000 per month.

OK I will....oh, no I already have..

whatever. you know nothing.

I know nothing? I know what I see and read..and I am as entitled to my opinion as you are, Pip.

Oh please, is this question really necessary? Of course, I know plenty. If you'd bothered to read my post properly you would see that.

The UK property market goes in cycles and not necessarily due to whether there is a recession or not. What tends to happen in the UK is that property prices, when booming, usually outstrip people's ability to borrow the required funds. When I bought my first house I could only borrow 3x my gross earnings but up until a few years ago, before the banking crisis, it wasn't unusual to see lenders offering to lend 6x someone's gross earnings. Now it doesn't take a rocket scientist to work out that it's obvious that lending at the old ratio would have meant that it would have been impossible to sell anything unless the lenders relaxed their criteria, which they duly did thus fuelling a series of unsustainable increases in property values. Another factor was people buying to rent to others which pushed up the value of first time buyer properties beyond what people could afford.

Now as peterweg has pointed out, what is true for the UK isn't necessarily true for Poland but when I see you saying that you can get 2000PLN for such a small place I can only compare it to what I know about the UK property market. 2000PLN equates to £370 on the current exchange rate, someone on minumum wage here in the UK earns around £250 a week which is around 5400PLN a month. What is the average wage in Poland? 1500PLN a month? So you can ask and get 500PLN a month more than someone on average wages can earn in a month. So maybe by looking at some simple economics you can see why I think the sort of property you want to buy and rent out is over priced. Please don't think I am having a go at you personally, I am only responding on this thread because of the example you have given and you are operating in a market created by others. I think you should be given some credit for wanting to renovate the place and furnish it with new products as many landlords would not. I don't want to get into the political arguments about the perceived rights and wrongs of buy to let as I can see the arguments on both sides and there are merits on each side.

i think these prices are very reasonable!

ok, fair enough.

look at the links I have provided. These are from oferty.net which is probably the largest real estate portal.

if you search for rentals in Warsaw, Powisle there are loads of flats. Some larger some smaller. The bachelors all hover around the same price. 1200 for 20 m2 up to 1800 for 30m2. Plus utilities averages to about 2000 pln. If we buy something of this size in this area I would expect to rent it at a similar price. I also expect that something this size would be rented for two people- much like a dorm and that is ok- I will accommodate this meaning because I am an interior designer and I expect it will be rented to students I will design and furnish it so that two people have their own private living space. The way I see it -it is a win win situation. Students have a nice place to live and we have tenants.

Why is this such a bad thing.
I have lived in sh*t hole blocks in Warsaw. In fact four different ones. They stank like ****, furnished with 60's communist crap furniture and over priced and every month without fail the Polish owners would come to collect their money and then b*tch at me if I put a picture on the wall. I even had some b*tch say I broke her balcony and expected me to pay for it.

If you treat people with respect- you will get respect in return- this applies to all aspects of life.

I don't think that buying a 25m2 apartment with an income of 2000 pln is going to make me a millionaire and that is not the intent. The intent is to have financial security and buying a property in an established area of Warsaw with a limit on construction just makes sense from a real estate perspective.

what always amazes me is the obsession with inner city property, why pay those prices when you can drive out a few miles into the country and slash it by way more than 50%. In the UK people cant wait to move out of the cities, in PL its the complete opposite.

Poland really is a "keeping up with the Jones's" kind of place, never is that more evident than when you're at the cemetery, many of these marble masterpieces are practically crypts that cost thousands upon thousands, a low range one is about 6,000 PLN. I'm thinking where the hell did these chaps get that kind of money from?

Witam WB
The properties I referred to above are on the outskirts - near Partynice, beyond Krzyki, Klecina etc. Come in to town and near Arkady and around there, quite a few brown field sites and they are building on those now, probably even more pricey. But you are of course correct, you can get a whole detached house with integral garage some miles out of Wroc for 299 tyk according to a poster I saw last week.

I think its infrastructure related. The Poles have got so used to having terrible roads they automatically gravitate towards towns. The light will go on when they start using all these new roads.


You can' t take it with you and you know your relatives will visit the grave several times a year so they and their friends can appreciate it.

And also the price of petrol, in relation to context, imagine the situation in England if petrol was 3-4 time more expensive!! They wouldn't be trying to get out of the cities then.

If you are on an average wage of 2000 zloty a month and driving 20 km to work in the city , I reckon you may have serious economical problems. That is why people choose cage like apartments in the cities. Inhumane but practical.

The prices dont drop so much outside the city, anyway,,its nowhere near 50%. Maybe outside the main cities in Poland A.


My family here in Poland took a loan out to pay. No mystery.

Are you kidding Pip? I have 2 sons studying at public universities in London, and one is paying 130 GBP per week for a (tiny) room in a shared house (east end of London) and the other 170 GBP per week in a room in the uni proivided dorm (that's respectively 3200 PLN and 4100 PLN per month!!)

Just had a quick look on Oferty - hmm it seems a lot of these new estate flats are being offered as rentals - so perhaps the buyers are landlords not ordinary workers? I am just guessing, small sample of research online today, I could be totally wrong.

We have a flats land-grab problem in the UK - people worried about their pensions and currency devaluing became landlords and bought flats that they could let to tenants - this priced many first time buyers out. Of course in the UK the yield is better in many towns than generally here in Poland. (By yield I mean return on the money "invested" in the flat by way of receiving rental income.) Not 100% sure but am seeing rents looking a bit more competitive here in Wrocław than last year. Still quite a few expensive ones, however.

so by this very point you have actually proven the person wrong who said that my price would be too expensive.
if 2000 pln per month is fair market value then that is what we will charge and based on oferty.net it is quite fair.
It is just common sense that places around colleges and uni's are expensive. I thought everybody knew this. then add to the fact that the area is established and building space is limited and it is in close proximity to nowy swiat and the old town.

sometimes people just feel the need to crap over others. that is fine- i know we are not doing anything wrong or unethical.

pip, I'm 100% with you on this one. You're not creating anything? True, but the transfer of money is what makes our world go around, and the person you buy from can buy or build another or just spend his gains on something else.

Exploitation? Hardly.

I think his point was that students could not afford it, well the vast majority couldn't.

thanks, I am still trying to wrap my head around the concept that they follow.

ps- sorry for the American crack

First of all the topic is about Prices going down, and yes they are.
In relation to rent and cost in Poland ,this link provides the facts. Makes sh1t of the spin that the developer's wife is trying to put on it.

my husband is not a developer.