"Gregory Morrow" a écrit dans le
message de news:fe29m5$7is$1@aioe.org...
> Here ya go, DFM...:
>
>
> http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/03/greathomesanddestinations/03gh-bucharest.html
>
>
> By JON GORVETT
> Published: October 3, 2007
> BUCHAREST
>
>
> Romanian Rewards
>
> "The streets may sometimes be chaotic and the sidewalks crowded, but to
> some
> of the New Yorkers who live in Romania's capital, it can also be one of
> the
> most rewarding cities in Europe.
>
> Leslie Hawke, mother of Ethan Hawke, the actor, is one such resident. She
> moved here seven years ago and now lives in a rooftop apartment on the
> city'
> s main street, Calea Victoria.
>
> "It's Bucharest's Fifth Avenue," she said, looking down from her
> 45-square-meter (485-square-foot) terrace, which curves around her
> apartment. "It has all the major department stores and museums, palaces
> and
> squares."
>
> Spreading out below her apartment is the eclectic jumble of downtown. And
> across the rooftops are the onion domes of a Russian church rising above
> 19th-century French-style apartment buildings. This is Europe's
> sixth-largest city, with a population of 1.9 million.
>
> Ms. Hawke's 1930s-era apartment has 95 square meters (over 1,000 square
> feet) of living space, with a large living room, kitchen, two bedrooms and
> a
> bathroom, and is just a few minutes' walk from her office. She works for
> Ovidiu Rom, a nongovernmental organization that uses education programs to
> support families and children, a job that spun out of the Peace Corps
> volunteer work she did when she first arrived in the country.
>
> "One of the really great things about Bucharest is the sense of
> proximity,"
> she said. "Here, everything is still going on in the city center. I almost
> never have to go to a social or work event by car."
>
> That suits Anthony Raftopol, too. "As someone who grew up in the Big
> Apple,"
> he said, "I am absolutely fine with the metro and the buses."
>
> Mr. Raftopol works for Salans, a law firm. He moved here when it opened a
> local office in the 1990s. He bought a two-bedroom, one-bath apartment in
> the city center near Cismigiu Park, where he and his partner, Shawn
> Hargon,
> now take their 13-month-old daughter, Zoe.
>
> Mr. Raftopol's parents were Romanians who fled the Communist regime in
> 1968.
> Although the family ended up in New York, he was born in a refugee camp in
> Austria - where, he said, an exiled Hungarian countess used to help take
> care of him.
>
> As both a buyer and a real estate lawyer, he has seen the market evolve.
> "Prices have exploded here," he said. "The economy has been growing fast,
> yet the supply of apartments just hasn't kept up with demand. We estimate
> they need about 300,000 new units at the moment, and so far this year
> there
> are plans to build just 30,000. At that rate, the boom in prices should
> continue for a decade."
>
> Because of the shortage, prices are comparable with those in Vienna and
> Berlin.
>
> "Residential property in new developments in the suburbs goes for around
> 1,500 euros a square meter these days," or $198 a square foot, said
> another
> real estate specialist, Brian Jardine, an American who works here for Wolf
> Theiss, an Austrian law firm. He said that 100- to 150-square-meter
> (1,100-
> to 1,500-square-foot) apartments downtown sell for around 300,000 euros
> ($426,000). "That's five or six times what it was five years ago," he
> said.
>
> With high potential yields, Bucharest has become an increasingly popular
> place for foreigners to invest, and now that Romania is a member of the
> European Union, the number of those investments is likely to grow.
>
> "Many individuals from places such as Germany, the U.K. and Austria are
> already here," Mr. Raftopol said. "The U.S. resident community is pretty
> small but tends to be made up of people who have quite a commitment to the
> place."
>
> Ms. Hawke added: "Buying here is quite different from back home too. One
> great thing is, you can do it all via a notary, without all the lawyers
> you
> need back in the States."
>
> There are no restrictions on Americans' buying houses or apartments. Land
> purchases, however, must be done through a company registered in Romania,
> although foreigners are allowed to own such companies. "Setting one up is
> a
> no-brainer," Mr. Raftopol said. "It's very quick and at about 300 euros
> ($426), pretty cheap."
>
> Transactions can be complex. When Ms. Hawke bought her apartment, she
> explained, she was asked for 113,000 euros ($160,460) in cash. "I didn't
> feel so great carrying that around town in a bag, though," she said, "so
> eventually I persuaded them that we could all just go to the bank and
> watch
> the wire transfer go through."
>
> Finding a place also can require unconventional methods.
>
> "Word of mouth is the best way," Ms. Hawke said. "I bought a little place
> out in the countryside recently and, to get that, I first asked a guy in a
> local shop, who took me to the local priest, who took me to the mayor, and
> while I was there a guy came by wanting to buy some wine off the mayor and
> said he had a place for sale. It's not quite that extreme in Bucharest,
> but
> it always helps to network."
>
> Another issue to be aware of is restitution, Mr. Raftopol said. He
> explained
> that in 1946, private owners were stripped of their property by the
> Communists' nationalization process, and that after 1989, those owners
> were
> shut out when current residents were allowed to buy their homes. Problems
> sometimes cropped up later, when the original owners were allowed to claim
> restitution.
>
> "It's a good idea to hire a local lawyer to do a full title search to find
> out if there are any restitution issues on the place you want to buy," Mr.
> Raftopol said. "They should also look to see if the property is earthquake
> proof." Bucharest is in an earthquake zone, and buildings are graded
> according to their ability to withstand tremors.
>
> Restoring a property also can be a challenge, as Romanian workers have
> been
> heading to other European Union countries in search of higher wages,
> creating a shortage of skilled workers. Yet "all the big home-improvement
> stores are here," Mr. Raftopol said. "The materials cost what they would
> in
> the U.S., but the labor is much less." The restoration of his apartment
> cost
> 20 to 25 percent less than what it would have in America, he said.
>
> Bucharest has appeal but it is definitely for someone who likes a
> challenge.
> "It is a city still figuring out what it wants to be," Mr. Raftopol said.
> "It's not the sort of place you come because everything is already fixed
> up
> and done; you come here because it's not like that. Instead, the potential
> is still there for it to become something else - something really
> different."
>
>
>
>
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