Avison Young released its new interactive South Florida office market reports for first-quarter 2021. The reports include data visualizations for rents, vacancy rates, leasing activity, and more.

Below, I’ve included summaries for each South Florida office market. The section title for each market is hyperlinked to the corresponding report, and at the end of each summary, you’ll find a link to an interactive dashboard which allows you to see specific data and analytics for the market and its submarkets.

Miami Office Market Report (Q1 2021)

Strong incentives programs are attracting considerable activity from new to market tenants and there is an unprecedented amount of pent-up leasing activity. Tenants currently in the market include Microsoft (30,000 sf), Chicago-based hedge fund Citadel (80,000 sf), and Baker & McKenzie for an unspecified amount. Several major office developers (Hines, Related Cos., Adler Group, Kushner Cos./Block Capital Group) are moving forward with significant new office and mixed-use projects despite a wave of new supply in 2019 and 2020, which will keep upward pressure on vacancy rates in the near term. Click here to explore full interactive analytics for Miami-Dade County and its submarkets.

Fort Lauderdale Office Market Report (Q1 2021)

Total vacancy in Fort Lauderdale’s office market has risen by 100 basis points (bps) since the end of 2020 to 17.3%, with sublease space growing slightly by 20 bps over the same trailing 90-day period to an 11-yr high of 1.2%. The greatest concentration of sublease space remains in Sawgrass Park, where it has reached 3.4%. Leasing activity during the first quarter in Fort Lauderdale was a bit slow, accounting for just over 310,000 square feet (sf), however that was tempered by the -346,360 sf of recorded net absorption. Asking rents have grown by a moderate 1.3% over the last quarter to a current $35.18 per sf although deal terms have led to a slight deceleration in overall effective rents. Investors continue to gain confidence and sales activity is beginning to rebound, with the most notable sale of the quarter involving the $44.2 million acquisition of Cypress Financial Center by Vision Properties. Click here to explore full interactive analytics for Broward County and its submarkets.

Palm Beach Office Market Report (Q1 2021)

NewDay USA, a home mortgage originator to veterans, announced plans to open a second U.S. headquarters at The Related Companies (“Related”) new 360 Rosemary building as hedge fund Elliott Management also looks to lease 40,000 square feet in the building. Financial giant Goldman Sachs also plans to move its asset management division to South Florida, and recently posted dozens of job listings with West Palm Beach as the location. Related has been very bullish on downtown West Palm Beach and is rumored to have two key deals under contract that would allow them to control the majority of all class A space downtown with 1.6 million sf under ownership. Click here to explore full interactive analytics for Palm Beach County and its submarkets.