2019 State of the City Houston Office Market Analysis by James Robertson Jr. Managing Broker for Workspace Commercial Real Estate.
Welcome to the First Annual Workspace Real Estate State of the City of Houston’s Office Market Analysis. This video will discuss Houston office rent trends, economic trends, new developments and everything you need to have an understanding of where we are headed as a City compared to the rest of the country in regards to office space.
To kick things off, I have to tell you that the talking heads, Wall Street, and Fortune 500 companies are worried about Houston. Let’s talk numbers for a second:
In 2019:
- We had just 2.9 Million sf of new office space built to the market
- 2.1 million sf of existing office space leased out by new tenants
- A Vacancy rate of 16.9% (the second highest in the country). This is not a race that we want to win (lol)
- Annual rent growth of just 1% in the last year. (If you are hearing this and about to sign a new lease, you need to talk to your broker, show him this report and have him/her explain how they are planning to tweak your negotiation strategy.).
Houston based business that is leasing office space, hear me and rejoice because this is a tenant market and will be for several more quarters based on the historically low rent growth we have been experiencing, low construction, and the second lowest vacancy rate in the nation at over 16% . That is City wide, not its important to note that one city, but several large markets. Landlords in the Woodlands or Katy are going to negotiate ALOT harder than Southwest Houston market or Greenspoint because Vacancy is lower, and their rent growth is almost double those other markets. Subscribe to this channel as we will break down each market in the Houston area so that we can go into this in great detail.