First mall to go bankrupt: Tiago Oradea up for auction
Tiago Oradea is the first mall in Romania to go bankrupt, with
the court-appointed liquidator to put the project up for auction
over the next two weeks. The starting price will be 35.5 million
euros, half the investment made, which was paid for with a 65
million-euro loan granted by UniCredit Austria and UniCredit
Tiriac.
Seen as "shopping temples," the malls are starting to show signs of
failure, so that after two projects in Braila and Sibiu were closed
for lack of tenants and customers, the first bankruptcy came, with
Casa de Insolventa Transilvania (Transilvania Insolvency Firm) as
legal liquidator having set the auction for the mall developed by
Irish developer Mivan for the 3rd of June.
Developers tried to build more malls than the market can take for
the time being, on plots of land outside cities and without taking
into account competition across the street and the purchasing power
of the people living in the area. With the onset of the crisis,
retailers backed out and owners were left with hectares of
unoccupied retail space, in which they had sunk tens of millions of
euros.
"The mall was supposed to be completed at the beginning of last
year but the developer delayed the inauguration and then went
insolvent. At first, leases for about 15% of the total space had
been signed, now we don't know anything more about it," said
Andreea Anghelof, partner of Casa de Insolventa Transilvania.
UniCredit officials had not provided any comment by the time the
story was ready for print.