SAN JOSE — Downtown areas of the Bay Area's three largest cities are seeing a high variety of empty offices, in line with a brand new report, indicating that companies and staff are still avoiding the region's urban cores.
In the second quarter of 2024 (April to June), a couple of third of office buildings in downtown San Jose, Oakland and San Francisco were vacant, reported industrial real estate firm CBRE.
According to the CBRE report, emptiness rates within the inner city districts of those three major cities reached an all-time high or record level within the second quarter.
Here are some details on the second quarter office emptiness levels within the urban cores of the three cities:
— San Francisco had by far the very best emptiness rate for office buildings among the many three downtown areas. In the second quarter, the emptiness rate was 36.8% – a record high.
– In downtown Oakland, the office emptiness rate was 31.8%, a historic high.
– In Downtown San Jose, the office emptiness rate was 31.5%, which is comparable to the primary quarter of 2024 (January to March) and the third quarter of 2023 (July to September) emptiness rate.
Subletting efforts by tenants searching for to vacate their office space could exacerbate the emptiness problem within the Bay Area usually and in downtown markets specifically.
Large-scale layoffs at technology firms and a decline within the tech industry's need for employment opportunities have led to more empty office buildings across the Bay Area.
Moreover, it is evident that even after the lifting of coronavirus-related business closures ordered by state and native authorities, staff haven’t returned to their jobs at the identical rate as before the COVID outbreak.
An evaluation of the CBRE report shows that the issues look like particularly acute within the inner-city districts.
While the office emptiness rate in downtown San Jose was 31.5% within the second quarter, the office emptiness rate in Silicon Valley as a complete was 19.5%.
Likewise, the emptiness rate in downtown Oakland, at 31.8%, was far worse than the general office emptiness rate of 21.8% within the East Bay region, which incorporates Oakland, Berkeley, Emeryville, Alameda, San Leandro and Richmond.
San Jose's business and political leaders are concerned in regards to the shortage of office staff and have increased their give attention to what Mayor Matt Mahan calls the “experience economy” to draw more people downtown.
Downtown San Jose's experience economy consists of a greater number of unique entertainment and dining options attributable to the dearth of office staff.
There are indications that forward-looking firms, similar to providers of artificial intelligence technologies, could help strengthen the three inner-city districts.
“Increased demand from AI-related companies has helped drive active demand” from firms searching for office space in Silicon Valley, CBRE reported.
Originally published:
image credit : www.mercurynews.com