In the eyes of many investors, Berlin has passed Munich for the first time and taken its place as the real estate market with the finest investment opportunities in Europe. Hamburg, in turn, remains among the five most attractive European locations, along with the up-and-coming cities of Madrid and Athens, as well as Dublin, which has retained its place among the top five from last year.

This is according to Emerging Trends in Real Estate Europe 2015, an annual survey conducted by the Urban Land Institute (ULI) and the auditing and consultancy firm PwC. The extensive survey is based on interviews with around 500 market experts, and has been done every year since 2006.

Berlin is considered a media and technology hot spot, and has a comparatively young population. In fact, Berlin-based start-ups raised €1.4bn in venture capital last year, more than their competitors in London. The inflow of people to the city has swelled to an annual rate of 40,000.

“If you bought a condominium in a downtown district five years ago, you could be looking at an appreciation of roughly 100% today,” said Nikolaus Ziegert, managing partner at ZIEGERT – Bank und Immobilienconsulting GmbH. He added: “In the district of Mitte, the going rate for new condominiums is €4-6,000sqm on average.”