The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Private Rental Housing Market in Poland: What Do Experts Say and What Do Actual Data Show?

Abstract

The aim of the article is to determine the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the level of housing rents using the example of the City of Krakow. This study is based on objective data on rental prices and subjective information obtained from real estate agents using a questionnaire survey. The research revealed that the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic actually led to a 6-7% decrease in prices in the rental market in Krakow, while at the same time the surveyed real estate agents had estimated that rents would drop by about 13%. With the second wave of the pandemic, it is possible to see that its immediate impact, i.e. between the third and fourth quarter of 2020, has led to a further 6.25% drop in rents. It should be noted that the latter decrease was very accurately predicted, both by the survey respondents and by the econometric models used. Finally, the results of the analysis also indicated that the worsening of the pandemic in the last quarter of 2020 will have a significant impact on rent levels in Krakow for all of next year. Regardless of how the economy develops, rental prices are forecast to fall further in 2021q1. However, in the subsequent quarters of 2021, rents are projected to increase, but ultimately their level will not return to pre-pandemic values even in 2021q4. The latter is likely to happen only in the second half of 2022.

Did the COVID-19 Pandemic Crisis Affect Housing Prices Evenly in the U.S.?

“…Marona and Tomal [10] found that the COVID-19 pandemic had a considerable impact upon the workflow of real estate brokers and their clients' attitudes in the city of Krakow, Poland. Another research work of theirs revealed that the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic actually led to a 6-7% decrease in prices in the rental market in Krakow [11]. Del Giudice et al [12] developed a real estate pricing model to evaluate the short and mid-run effects of COVID-19 on housing prices in the Campania Region, Italy.…”

Modelling the Impact of Different COVID-19 Pandemic Waves on Real Estate Stock Returns and Their Volatility Using a GJR-GARCHX Approach: An International Perspective

“…Moreover, especially during the first wave, the mortgage market froze, and banks started to increase credit requirements. In the case of Poland, the substantial impact of the pandemic on stock returns during its second and third waves may be due to the fact that the government introduced very farreaching restrictions in this period (Tomal and Marona 2021). At the same time, however, the impact strength of the pandemic on the volatility of stock returns in Poland decreased, which indicate that market participants in the wake of the increased incidence of the disease tried to limit their actions in the stock market compared to the period of the first wave.…”

The private rental housing market before and during the COVID-19 pandemic: A submarket analysis in Cracow, Poland

“…Despite speculation concerning the importance of the COVID-19 crises for urban housing markets ( Batty, 2020 ; Goodman and Magder, 2020 ; Tanrıvermiş, 2020 ; Tomal and Marona, 2021 ), we are not aware of any study examining how the outbreak of the pandemic has altered the formation of residential urban submarkets. To fill this research gap, our objective was to analyze changes in the factors that determine the rental prices and the spatiotemporal structure of housing submarkets before and during the COVID-19 pandemic in Cracow, Poland.…”