OFFICE RENTS BOTTOM OUT IN Q3 2021
Rents and occupancy
- Prime Grade office rents in the Raffles Place / Marina Bay precinct grew for the first time since Q4 2019, with rents rising by 0.2% quarter-on-quarter (q-o-q) to S$9.98 per square foot per month (psf pm). Office rents turned a corner and bottomed out in Q3 2021 as occupancy rates for prime offices in the precinct remained relatively stable, falling marginally by 0.7 percentage points (pp) q-o-q to 93.6%, a slight reversal from the 0.1 pp growth recorded in Q2 2021.
- In tandem with the firm signs of improvement in the office rental market, the volume of pre-termination space available fell 78.9% q-o-q in Q3 2021, declining empathically from the 360,000-sf estimate in Q2 2021 to some 76,000 sf in Q3 2021. The decrease in shadow space was expected as the flight-to-quality continued with corporates taking advantage of the rare opportunity to snap up premium spaces in prime buildings that were normally fully occupied, before rents start to increase significantly.
