Almost a third of the total amount was spent on Belaya Ploshad (74,000 sq. m, built in 2009), which VTB sold to O1 Properties for $1 billion, as consultants tacitly claim. There is no official data on the deal. Interestingly, the largest purchases were made by Russian investors. In first place is the aforementioned O1 Properties. In 2012, it also acquired Ducat Place III (33,000 sq. m, built in 2006, for approximately $370 million). “Swept everything in sight,” as one of the Big Five analysts put it. Bin Group paid Unicor Group $303 million (again, according to market estimates) for the Summit mixed-use complex (64,000 sq. m, office part – 18,500 sq. m, built in 2011). Among the iconic office buildings that changed hands in 2012 were also the Hals Tower, the Geneva House, the Berlin House and, according to some consultants, the Four Winds.

Brokers do not expect a repeat of last year's record this year. Sayan Tsyrenov, leading consultant of the capital markets department at Cushman & Wakefield, does not predict "large transactions" for the next 3-5 years. "By 2012, prices on the office space purchase and sale market entered a stage of stable equilibrium," analysts at Swiss Appraisal note. According to their estimates, prices have stabilized at around $10,000 per square meter. How long the equilibrium will last depends, among other things, on news from global capital markets.

There are at most a dozen investment-worthy properties on the Moscow office market, estimates Tom Devonshire-Griffin, head of the financial markets and investments department at Jones Lang LaSalle: “After the ban on new construction in the Central Business District, the supply of premium offices is limited to existing properties, and demand for such properties is high.” “There are enough properties for investment in 2013,” believes Ivan Gubochkin, head of the investment services department at CBRE. “The question is what the investor wants from the property – growth in value, a speculative investment in order to resell it later profitably, or a stable cash flow.”

Foreign investors are more likely to prefer well-built, small properties with long-term leases, says Devonshire-Griffin. Russian investors are interested in buildings in central Moscow, leased to multiple tenants at high rates. “The approach of Russian investors has become more analytical. The opportunity to obtain financing secured by the property being purchased is now important to them,” the consultant notes. Gubochkina is pleased that Russian investors have turned to quality properties: “They are becoming more active, paying a fair price, whereas previously they were only interested in distressed assets.”

"Investors' demands for the quality of the properties on offer are becoming ever higher," says Vladimir Sergunin, regional investment director at Colliers International . Moneybags are no longer satisfied with just class A (its share in the Moscow office market is growing – from 20% in 2011 to 25% in 2012 and to a projected 30% in 2013, according to Swiss Appraisal). They need prime, i.e. the best class A.

Among Russian investors in office real estate, there are more and more private companies created by people from “any sphere of big business” (oil, gas, pharmaceuticals, IT) – they have founded stable firms, receive good income and are looking for alternatives to bonds and other financial instruments, says Olga Pobukovskaya, director of the office real estate department at Colliers. For a private investor in Russia, there are not so many instruments that allow you to save and increase your own funds, develops the idea Anna Dvurechenskaya, commercial director of KR Properties.

The popularity rating, in her opinion, looks like this: bank deposit, managing a portfolio of securities independently or through mutual funds, playing the real estate market (resale and leasing). In the office market, according to Dvurechenskaya's observations, about 70% of requests are for rent, 30% - for purchase from investors and business owners who acquire offices for their own needs. Ready-made areas in finished properties in business districts are in demand.

The acquisition of an office property pays for itself through leasing it out over a period of approximately 10 years, according to analysts at Swiss Appraisal. That is, the profitability of office real estate remains at a fairly low level and, in their opinion, there are no prerequisites for a change in the trend in the near future. “Relatively high levels of empty office space and operating expenses push the already low threshold of real profitability even lower. A potential landlord should proceed from the so-called minimum (base) profitability, reducing the potential return on business by 20-30%,” the Swiss Appraisal report says.

Landmarks: Records of the past