Quicker recovery in S’pore office market

Singapore’s office market has stabilized, with tech firms and financial institutions driving the recovery, according to Cushman & Wakefield’s Q3 Asia Pacific Office overview. The property consultancy revealed that the local office market witnessed an earlier-than-expected rebound as the upcoming supply over the next three years has declined significantly.During the three-month period, Singapore posted the region’s third highest monthly office rent of US$6.6 psf, behind Tokyo (US$8.91 psf) and Hong Kong (US$11.26 psf).At present, the city-state’s property market is favourable to landlords, with rents forecasted to continue to rise until 2019. As such, tenants and occupants have become more receptive to early renewals or negotiations for relocations.Singapore also witnessed the region’s tenth lowest vacancy rate of about seven percent.  On the other hand, the top three markets in this regard were Gurgaon’s central business district (2.9 percent), Tokyo (3.5 percent) and Manila (5.3 percent).In addition, the report noted that competition among co-working space operators are heating up in the city-state following the entry of WeWork.Meanwhile, Cushman noted that demand for office space in Asia Pacific soared by 20 percent thanks to robust leasing activity in major cities in China, Manila and Bengaluru.Source: CommercialGuru, 1 Dec 2017