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Reuse radar

Sofia

Sofia publishes no register of empty buildings, but since 11 September 2026 its open-data portal holds the municipality's own 7,718 building outlines and, in Sofiaplan's data, a cadastre of 158,684 buildings with use and storeys. The State's list of properties it no longer needs names 78 State-held buildings in the city, and Colliers puts the Class A and B offices at about 11.8% empty, so the openings are public property, not private vacancy.
An empty building in Sofia with homes, balconies and neighbours drawn onto it in ink
Empty buildings on record
343
from 12 open sources
Vacant office space
297,000 m²
11.8% of the stock
Homes potential
—
not in the economic model’s office data yet

Office figures: Colliers — Class A and B stock of 2,519,800 m² at the end of June 2026; vacancy 11.6% (class A) and 11.9% (class B), taken as 11.8% overall (vacant area = stock × rate). Map built 2026-10-09.

Empty buildings in Sofia

One point per building, from public records, open data and cited reports. Filter by type, size and how sure the evidence is; open one to see who says so and whether it could become homes.

No register of empty buildings exists: the municipal building outlines carry no use and no vacancy flag, and the 42,632 municipal land parcels (same portal) are land, not buildings — they are not on the map.

Loading map…
Colour = type of building named officially likely reported
Missing a building?

Check any building in Sofia: could it become homes, and could the EHC model work there?

2 more buildings in Sofia reported in the news, not yet on the map

The articles do not give an address we could place, so these have no pin yet. From news reports, summed up in our own words with a link to each article — not checked on site by EHC.

  • unknown (Graffiti Street/ Tsar Shishman corner building), ul. Graf Ignatiev / ul. Tsar Shishman — reported empty · formerly residential buildingThe Secession-style building is uninhabited; its owners have sought approval to demolish it. Дневник (2025-06-20)
  • Родопа meat-processing complex (former Sofia slaughterhouse) — reported empty · formerly industrial buildingThe complex has been mostly unused since the beginning of the 21st century and is deteriorating Капитал (2026-07-15)

Where conversion makes sense, and who to talk to

The districts where empty space, the right zoning and a working neighbourhood come together, and the owners and programmes that open a door. 297,000 m² of offices stand empty (11.8% of the stock).

A hand outlining a neighbourhood on a city map, with small houses drawn inside

Slatina and Chelopechene (airport belt)

Two clusters of State-held industrial and office buildings that the Government's 2025 programme lists as no longer needed, next to the airport.

  • Chelopechene: 31 buildings of the Ministry of Transport, 10,208 m² in all (areas as the table gives them)
  • Slatina north: 12 buildings, 13,819 m² in all, with a 1,263 m² administrative building

Risk: Industrial halls in the airport noise zone, held by State companies; the list is preliminary and each property is still being checked before any sale.

1 source

Centre — Sredets and Serdika

The Municipal Council asked the State on 12 March 2026 to hand over two landmark buildings in the centre, the former Notary building (bul. Patriarh Evtimiy 2) and the former SDS headquarters (ul. Rakovski 134).

  • Both named in the Mayor's request, together with two plots and a park
  • A third State building, bul. Slivnitsa 235, is in use by the Ministry of Health

Risk: The report does not say that either building is empty; the transfer needs a Government decision, and the buildings are far above what a co-op can fit-out.

1 source

Lyulin and Nadezhda (municipal estates)

The largest stock of buildings the municipality owns: 865 of its 7,718 building outlines are in Lyulin and 464 in Nadezhda — schools, kindergartens and neighbourhood buildings on large post-war estates.

  • Lyulin 865 outlines, Nadezhda 464 (of 7,718, 8 Sept 2026)
  • Licence: Creative Commons Attribution

Risk: The register gives no use and no vacancy, and 3,141 of the 7,718 outlines are buildings in which the municipality owns only a unit or a share.

1 source

Signals to watch

Decisions, auctions and closures that change what becomes available, and when.

  1. 2026-09-20Six municipal properties go to auction

    Six municipal properties — five plots (one with a 111 m² public building, in Vrazhdebna) and a garage — are offered at auctions on 23–25 September 2026.

    1 source
  2. 2026-09-11The Municipality opens its building and cadastre data

    The first datasets of GIS Sofia reach the open-data portal, among them the register of municipal buildings (data of 8 September 2026) and the municipal land parcels, under a Creative Commons Attribution licence.

    1 source
  3. 2026-03-12Council asks the State for landmark buildings

    The Municipal Council votes unanimously to ask the Government for a free transfer of the former Notary building, the former SDS headquarters, Vrana park, two plots and a Ministry of Health building.

    1 source
1 earlier signal
  1. 2025-05-08
    Government lists State properties it no longer needs

    The Council of Ministers adopts a programme with a list of about 4,400 State properties it considers unneeded; the Ministry of Regional Development later publishes a table of 5,170 rows and says each is checked before any sale.

    1 source

Sources, and what we cannot see

21 sources connected, 1 waiting for access. We only use data we may lawfully reuse; where a publisher blocks automated access we do not work around it — a person downloads it, or we ask for permission.

Every source, its licence and when we last read it
SourceAccessRecordsStatusLicence
OpenStreetMap disused/abandoned tags and brownfields
OpenStreetMap contributors
Open API315Live
2026-10-09
ODbL 1.0 (© OpenStreetMap contributors)
Rail, S-Bahn and U-Bahn stations (OpenStreetMap)
OpenStreetMap contributors
Open APIscoringLive
2026-10-09
ODbL 1.0 (© OpenStreetMap contributors)
Building heights: GlobalBuildingAtlas (TU Munich)
Zhu, X. X., Chen, S., Zhang, F., Shi, Y., Wang, Y. (2025), Technical University of Munich
GlobalBuildingAtlas: an open global and complete dataset of building polygons, heights and LoD1 3D models. Earth System Science Data 17(12), 6647–6668, doi:10.5194/essd-17-6647-2025. Read from the Parquet copy on Source Cooperative. Satellite-derived heights (typically 1.5–3 m error in Europe), turned into storeys with storey heights fitted on Berlin; used only where no register or official 3D model sizes the building.
Open download925 buildings sizedLive
2026-10-09
CC BY-NC 4.0 (heights); footprints from OpenStreetMap and Microsoft: ODbL
Road noise (EU Environmental Noise Directive, Lden)
European Environment Agency
Open APIscoringLive
2026-10-09
EEA standard re-use policy (attribution)
Leerstandsmelder.de — public reports of empty buildings
Leerstandsmelder (Gängeviertel e.V., Hamburg)
Shown while we ask Leerstandsmelder for permission. Reports since 2016 only, with the address, the month reported and a link to each entry; not checked by EHC. Each point says when a report has since been marked demolished, lived in, in interim use or rebuilt on Leerstandsmelder, and the owner type the reporter gave (private owners are never named).
Asking for permission0Pending
2026-10-09
Credited to Leerstandsmelder.de; asking for permission
Open-ended property funds: buildings they report partly empty
Open-ended real-estate funds (each point names its fund and report)
German and Austrian open-ended public property funds must list every property with its vacancy (or letting) rate in their annual and half-year reports. scripts/reuse/import-fund-reports.ts reads those lists; properties at 10 % vacancy or more are shown, those at 25 % or more count as evidence.
Open download0Live
2026-10-09
Published fund report (KAGB / KARBV property list), cited per point
Co-working spaces, department stores, banks, hotels and cinemas listed as permanently closed
Overture Maps Foundation (closure data: BrightQuery company records)
Places with operating_status "permanently_closed" in the monthly Overture release, read by scripts/reuse/import-overture-closures.ts and matched to the building they sit in. A closed business is usually one unit; names are shown only for companies, never for sole traders.
Open download0Live
2026-10-09
CDLA Permissive 2.0 (Overture Maps Foundation)
Land without current use and stalled construction, mapped from satellite imagery (Copernicus Urban Atlas 2006–2018)
European Environment Agency — Copernicus Land Monitoring Service
Urban Atlas class 13400 (brownfields, demolition sites and gaps in the built-up area, 0.25 ha and up) compared across the 2006, 2012 and 2018 editions, so each plot says how long it has stood unused; plus construction sites (13300) already under way in 2012, and 2012 construction sites left unused by 2018. Read from the EEA's open ArcGIS services, the same way in every radar city. The 2021 edition (Copernicus Data Space) drops plots built on since 2018 where scripts/reuse/import-urban-atlas-2021.ts has been run. Points are context, never evidence of vacancy.
Open API253Live
2026-10-09
Copernicus open data (© European Union, Copernicus Land Monitoring Service 2006–2021, EEA)
Stalled construction and buildings held by insolvent developers
EHC research (dated press and court sources per point)
Signa, Adler/Consus and other developer insolvencies since 2022 and stalled sites, each with its latest dated status (src/scripts/data/reuse/stalled-projects.json; news leads from scripts/reuse/mine-news.ts are reviewed before they join).
EHC research0Live
2026-10-09
Cited publisher per point
Church buildings the dioceses and regional churches plan to give up
Catholic dioceses and Protestant regional churches (their building plans), via EHC research
Buildings a church body’s published building plan or recent reporting names as to be given up, without church funding, for sale or lease, or profaned (src/scripts/data/reuse/church-plans.json and brussels-churches.json).
EHC research0Live
2026-10-09
Cited publisher per point
Named buildings and sites from EHC research (each with its own source)
European Housing Coop research
Includes the library’s public lighthouse conversions (src/scripts/data/reuse/lighthouses.json), shown under "Already converting" with a link to their library page.
EHC research6Live
2026-10-09
Facts cited to their publishers
Year built and listing: OpenStreetMap building tags
OpenStreetMap contributors
start_date / construction_date and heritage / listed_status of the OpenStreetMap outline a record is matched to, where no register answers. Read with the outline match, not a separate query.
Open APIscoringLive
2026-10-09
ODbL 1.0 (© OpenStreetMap contributors)
State buildings the Government's 2025 programme lists as no longer needed
Council of Ministers — Programme for exercising the State's rights over State properties (8 May 2025); table of the Ministry of Regional Development (MRRB), matched to the cadastre by Boyan Yurukov (opendata.yurukov.net)
Open download78Live
2026-10-09
None stated — public information of the Council of Ministers' programme of 8 May 2025 (table published by the Ministry of Regional Development), cadastral matching by Boyan Yurukov; credited to both
State plots the Government's 2025 programme lists as no longer needed
Council of Ministers — Programme for exercising the State's rights over State properties (8 May 2025); table of the Ministry of Regional Development (MRRB), matched to the cadastre by Boyan Yurukov (opendata.yurukov.net)
Open download55Live
2026-10-09
None stated — public information of the Council of Ministers' programme of 8 May 2025 (table published by the Ministry of Regional Development), cadastral matching by Boyan Yurukov; credited to both
Buildings owned by the Municipality of Sofia (whole buildings)
Столична община — GIS Sofia, open data portal "Данните на София" (dataset "Общински сгради", data of 8 Sept 2026)
Open download3,547Live
2026-10-09
Creative Commons Attribution (licence field of the dataset on urbandata.sofia.bg)
Buildings in which the Municipality of Sofia owns a unit or a share
Столична община — GIS Sofia, open data portal "Данните на София" (dataset "Общински сгради", data of 8 Sept 2026)
Open download3,152Live
2026-10-09
Creative Commons Attribution (licence field of the dataset on urbandata.sofia.bg)
Houses, residential and commercial buildings on forced public sale (private enforcement agents)
Bulgarian Chamber of Private Enforcement Agents — public register of sales (sales.bcpea.org)
Open download4Live
2026-10-09
None stated (a statutory public notice board); credited to the Chamber of Private Enforcement Agents
Shops, offices and other premises on forced public sale (private enforcement agents)
Bulgarian Chamber of Private Enforcement Agents — public register of sales (sales.bcpea.org)
Open download6Live
2026-10-09
None stated (a statutory public notice board); credited to the Chamber of Private Enforcement Agents
Administrative, business, science, trade, hotel, health, education and public buildings of 400 m² or more on the cadastre
Столична община — Sofiaplan, dataset "Сгради — Разгърната застроена площ (800 м)" (cadastral buildings with use and storeys, data of 1 Jan 2019)
Open download1,279Live
2026-10-09
None set on the dataset page (the portal's other datasets are Creative Commons Attribution) — shown with credit to Sofiaplan / the Municipality of Sofia
Industrial heritage sites with a re-functioning regime (2009 master plan)
Столична община — Sofiaplan, dataset "Обекти на индустриалното наследство" (data of 1 Jan 2009)
Open download14Live
2026-10-09
None set on the dataset page — shown with credit to Sofiaplan / the Municipality of Sofia
Buildings named in the news (each with its article)
Local and national press, read by EHC
Buildings the news reports empty, for sale or to let, to be demolished or being converted (src/scripts/data/reuse/news-building-leads.json; rules in src/lib/reuse/news-layer.ts). A report that names a building already on the map is shown on its card instead of a second point; one an open source contradicted, or that says the building is in use, is left out. Not checked on site.
EHC research1Live
2026-10-14
Facts with a link to the article; the one-line summary is ours — no article text is republished
Probable era: estimated from a street photo (Panoramax, Mapillary, Google Street View)
Panoramax and Mapillary contributors; Google Street View (research use agreed with Google, 14 Oct 2026); estimate by EHC with a vision model
Where no register dates a building: its era read from a Panoramax or Mapillary photo looking at it — Google Street View only where no open photo answers (scripts/reuse/estimate-photo-eras.ts), only when the building is clearly visible and the model is confident, and only as “before 1945” or “1945 or later” — the split it got right for 89% of buildings with a register year in Amsterdam and Paris, and 89% from Street View pictures alone (photo-eras/calibration.json). An estimate: a sentence in the conversion check, never points.
Open APIscoringLive
2026-10-14
Open photos CC BY-SA 4.0 or Licence Ouverte 2.0 (per picture); Street View read for research only, never stored or shown; only the estimated era is published, never a photo

What this radar cannot see yet

  • No register of empty buildings exists: the municipal building outlines carry no use and no vacancy flag, and the 42,632 municipal land parcels (same portal) are land, not buildings — they are not on the map.
  • The cadastre table behind the work-building layer and the building uses dates from 1 January 2019 and states no licence on its dataset page; the portal's General Terms for reuse were in public discussion until 14 July 2026.
  • The State list is the Government's preliminary table of June 2025: 16 of its 165 rows in the city have no outline and were not placed, and Defence, Interior, State-security and prison properties are left off by decision.
  • Municipal leases, the register of municipal transactions and the Municipality's tender documents are on sofia.bg as notices and PDFs, not as open data, so premises that are let or empty are not mapped.
  • The national open-data portal (data.egov.bg) answers HTTP 403 to automated clients and was not used. The orthophoto is the Ministry of Agriculture's, mirrored by OpenStreetMap Bulgaria; Sofia's own 2024 orthophoto WMS is announced but was not found.
  • No storey or floor-area source beyond the cadastre table; the lead can switch on that table (Sofiaplan dataset 397: storeys and footprint of every cadastral building, 1 Jan 2019) as a floor source.

Know an empty building we have missed?

Open data cannot see everything. Tell us about a building in Sofia that stands empty or barely used; once we have checked it, it joins the map under “Reported by visitors (checked)”.

A phone held up to photograph an empty shopfront, with a map pin drawn above it

We publish the address, the kind of building and your description once we have checked it — never your email. Please do not name the people who own or live in a building.

Radars nearby

The other radars in the same country and the nearest beyond. All 149 cities in the atlas

The figure on each card: empty buildings on record.

Belgrade, Serbia129empty buildings on recordBrașov, Romania14empty buildings on recordBucharest, Romania120empty buildings on recordNovi Sad, Serbia52empty buildings on recordPlovdiv, Bulgaria47empty buildings on recordPodgorica, Montenegro9empty buildings on recordPristina, Kosovo10empty buildings on recordSkopje, North Macedonia41empty buildings on recordThessaloniki, Greece42empty buildings on recordTimișoara, Romania25empty buildings on recordTirana, Albania38empty buildings on recordVarna, Bulgaria56empty buildings on record