"Plaza Centers" to invest minimum 500m USD in real estate construction in Serbia - construction of trade center in Kragujevac to commence in September

The Executive Manager of Israeli company for real estate construction and development “Plaza Centers”, Ran Starkman, said that that company would invest minimum of 500m USD in Serbia.

- Serbia is the country with a great potential, it registers progress in field of economy and that is where we are going to focus our operations within next 3-5 years - said Starkman and added that "Plaza centers" were willing to invest in Serbia and that they wanted to become a part of local economy, which needed shopping malls and hotels that were going to be provided by the company from Israel.

Speaking about the prices of real estate in Serbia and in the surrounding countries, he said that the prices in Serbia were higher than that company used to pay in other countries. However, Starkman estimated that the price of land would be cheaper in one or two years, not only in Serbia, but also in central and east Europe, due to world's credit and financial crisis.

- The investors who bought the land and don't have enough money to finance construction and survive the fall in real estate prices will have to sell that land in order to repay the loans - Starkman explained.

Company “Plaza Centers” plans to build a five-star hotel worth 150m EUR in Belgrade, on the location of former building of Ministry of Internal Affairs in Kneza Miloša Street. Construction of a shopping mall in Višnjica in Belgrade, worth 105m EUR, is also in the pipeline. Also, construction of trade center in Kragujevac will start in September, while the opening of several similar trade centers in some other cities in Serbia is in the pipeline.

"Plaza Centers" deals with construction, management and rental of trade and fun centers in east Europe and it is a part of Israeli public company "Elbit imaging".