On 23 May Äripäev held its Real Estate Conference, which included a panel discussion titled ‘The positives and negatives of planning – are developers visionless and local governments spiteful?’ Participants in the discussion were Oliver Alver (Head of the Tallinn Urban Planning Department), Kalle Aron (Innovation Manager and Member of the Management Board at Scandium Kinnisvara) and Janar Muttik (founder and CEO of Everaus Kinnisvara).
According to Janar Muttik, delays in administrative procedures inevitably lead to an increase in real estate prices. He added that officials are often too detailed when preparing plans and they are also often afraid to make decisions independently. ‘It’s worth easing this fear,’ Janar says, ‘there’s no point in delving too deep. We can go into detail within the scope of the building permit.’
Kalle Aron believes that the process is also drawn out because officials are overwhelmed. Oliver Alver vouched for this, but pointed out an even more critical fact – there are too many involved parties in Tallinn and, as a whole, the process has become so complex that it overloads the officials.
All participants in the panel said that streamlining the processing of plans in Tallinn is like trying to turn around a large ship – a lengthy and laborious process. Read more about what was said during the panel in the article of Kinnisvarauudised (in Estonian).
