Prices of urban land triple

Prices of land situated within localities have risen more than threefold over the last five years, while the trading value of the areas situated outside a locality is almost flat, according to data released by the Agriculture Ministry. Thus, the average value of a hectare of urban land stood at 351.99 million ROL (about 10,000 dollars) in the first eight months of this year, as compared to 114.02 million ROL in 1998. In the case of land situated outside localities, prices have gone up by merely 110,000 ROL/hectare, from 8.89 million to 9 million ROL. According to the Agriculture minister, the total amount of land inside localities that has been sold starting 1998 reaches 62,652 hectares, of which 3,673 hectares have been sold this year. The area is much larger in the case of land situated outside localities, where 317,300 hectares have been sold over the last five years, of which 64,654 this year. Over the first eight months of this year, 51 foreign individuals possessing Romanian citizenship acquired land situated outside localities. The market of urban land is operational within 2,668 localities, while the market of non-urban land corresponds to a number of 2,810 localities. As a matter of fact, real estate market investors have lately become increasingly interested in agricultural land that can be turned into urban land, given that the large cities see their supply of free unencumbered land that can be traded dwindling. ZF