News
YESTERDAY'S STRONG JOB NUMBERS
April 7, 2010
| New York City has lost fewer jobs than expected, and come out of the recession much faster than anticipated. (Then again, the Mets are undefeated. What would've been harder to believe a year ago?) Cushman & Wakefield NY Metro region COO Joe Harbert shared the news at yesterday's firm quarterly overview at Michael's. |
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| Q1 saw 5.7M SF in office leasing, better than Q1's in '07, '08, '09 and almost as good as ‘06's 5.9M SF, he says. Year-to-date, we've seen eight leases surpassing 100k SF, and in the over-10k SF group, slack in financial services leasing has been countered by education,government, and social services deals. The under-50k square footers accounted for 75% of the market activity—so we haven't been depending on the large leases for market movement—though we've got an influx of tenants seeking more than 100k SF on the ground. Investment activity also saw a Q1 increase: $3.3B of Manhattan commercial property was sold or under contract, nearly equaling the value of all property sold in Manhattan in ‘09. |
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| Manhattan retail also continued to show signs of stability: Only one of seven retail submarkets experienced a quarterly increase in availability, while four saw a decrease. Cushman's Joanne Podell, whom we snapped with colleagues Richard Baxter and Gene Spiegelman, confirmed the 34th Street corridor is practically leased up (she was part of the Ann Taylor Loft deal between 5th and 6th).Times Square is so tight that any deal in the near future will likely be off-market, she adds. And Madison Avenue, which at one point had 22 vacancies, is nearly full again. |
