Real estate funds in Slovakia have achieved record-breaking results, with assets surpassing €2.9 billion for the first time. According to the latest data from the National Bank of Slovakia (NBS), the asset volume of real estate funds grew by 12.3% year-on-year in the first quarter of 2025. Real estate funds now represent 25.7% of all mutual fund assets in Slovakia, which totaled €11.37 billion as of March 31. This places them just behind mixed funds, which maintain the largest share at 32.8%, although that segment has been in gradual decline. In contrast, real estate and equity funds have been steadily gaining ground. Equity funds currently account for 25.2% of the market, while bond funds represent 15.8%. Despite market volatility since 2022, real estate funds have maintained solid performance. Between 2017 and 2021, while inflation measured by consumer prices rose by 15%, real estate funds delivered an accumulated return of nearly 20%, according to Eva Sadovská, analyst at Wood & Company. From early 2022 through the end of 2023, returns reached 8.3%. In the first quarter of 2025, real estate funds continued to post positive returns even as equity fund profitability declined. Over the eight-year period from January 2017 to March 2025, real estate funds in Slovakia achieved a cumulative return with an average annual performance of 3.6%, according to the Slovak investor index (ISI100). “The decline in mixed funds is evident. At the end of 2021, they represented 50% of total mutual fund assets, but by March 2025 this had dropped to 32.8%,” said Sadovská. Meanwhile, real estate funds saw a quarterly increase of 2.7%, reaching their highest value to date. Looking across the border, Slovakia is not alone in this trend. In the Czech Republic, where Slovak investors are also active, real estate fund assets totaled €13.659 billion as of the end of March. This figure represents 18.6% of mutual fund assets and marks a year-on-year increase of 36.3%, as well as a quarterly rise of 13.9%, based on data from the Czech National Bank. Source: SME