Pillar H1 2017: New Hanza Construction Continues,

Riga, Latvia, 2017-07-17 07:58 CEST (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- In the first six months of 2017, Pillar was actively working on the development of the business and leisure area New Hanza, as well as continued selling out its real estate portfolio. With the intensive non-stop work, the first stage of the New Hanza infrastructure construction comes to its end. One of the largest objects built under this stage is a unique rainwater drainage and accumulation system with a reservoir of 13,000 m3 or 13 million litres. Currently, the technical equipment of this system is being installed in order to put it into operation in Q3 2017 along with the engineering communications built under the first stage on Mihaila Tāla Street and the surrounding area. Currently, the papers are being prepared for the construction of the second stage of infrastructure. In this stage, water, electricity, heating supply and wastewater disposal systems are going to be built under other streets of New Hanza. As reported earlier, Riga Council has taken into consideration the suggestions of Pillar regarding street names and has approved names for the five new streets of the New Hanza area. The new streets will be named after Oskars Stroks, Aleksandrs Laime, Gustavs Klucis, Vilhelms Ostvalds and Roberts Hiršs. According to the New Hanza development plan, in Q3 2017, it is planned to start the construction of the ABLV headquarters set of buildings and renovation of Riga cargo railway station warehouse building located in the territory. In addition, in preparation for the upcoming construction the last territory cleaning works are about to be completed and the unnecessary structures are going to be dismantled. In H1 2017, Pillar concluded more than 50 real estate sale transactions with a total sum of EUR 4.5m. The greatest share of all transactions is still in the sale of standard apartments, on which 22 transactions were done this year. 4 apartments were sold in the newly built residential premises, and there were 9 houses, 11 land plots and 5 commercial objects sold as well. “The first six months have been successful for Pillar group companies. In order to stick with the schedule of the New Hanza project development, we continue forming a team of professional construction and designing managers — this year more than 10 new specialists have joined our team. In turn, the positive trends on the residential and other real estate market enabled us to shrink our property portfolio, which we intend to sell out in the upcoming year and a half”, — points out Ieva Valtere, Chief Executive Officer of Pillar Management, SIA. Pillar group, established in 2008, is owned by the largest private bank in Latvia ABLV Bank, AS and it includes companies that operate in the field of real estate development, management, and trade. Pillar group includes Pillar Management, SIA, Pillar Holding Company, KS, Pillar Development, SIA, Pillar Contractor, SIA, Pillar Architekten, SIA and other companies. In total, Pillar supervises about 245 properties worth approximately EUR 38.5 million. So far, the company has invested a total of EUR 21 million in renovation of properties. Since 2013, Pillar is the major sponsor of the Annual Award in Latvian Architecture organized by the Latvian Association of Architects.  

         Ilmārs Jargans          Head of Public Relations Department          ABLV Bank, AS          Tel.: +371 6777 5296          e-mail: ilmars.jargans@ablv.com