Birmingham office take-up second highest in country in Q3 – GVA

OFFICE take-up in Birmingham city centre was the second highest in the country during the third quarter of 2013, with 174,000 sq ft of deals transacted.

Market analysis from Birmingham property consultancy GVA shows that with a healthy level of deals in the pipeline, Birmingham take-up this year is likely be comfortably above the five year average.

The figures form part of the latest edition of GVA’s Big Nine report, which revealed that city centre and out of town deals in the nine regional office centres recorded take-up of 1,737,000 sq ft in Q3, 7% above the five-year quarterly average.

The city centre market made up 65% of this total (1,126,000 sq ft), demonstrating a 10% rise on the five-year quarterly average, while the out of town market recorded take-up of 611,000 sq ft, a lift of 2%.

Carl Potter, director at GVA, said: “Occupier confidence has made a welcome return to a number of the regional city centres in Q3 paving the way for the highest take-up in five years. This is despite an ever decreasing lack of Grade A availability.

“To date, 2013 has been a positive year for Birmingham with 527,000 sq ft of space transacted, placing the city 10.5% above the average. 

“Deals such as Deutsche Bank taking occupancy of the 134,000 sq ft refurbished Five Brindleyplace have provided a boost to this year’s figures and a significant benefit to the city by helping to reverse the negative sentiment against the regional offices that we have seen in recent years.

“The next phases of development in most of the UK’s major cities are now positioned and ready but the mix of risk, viability and funding issues remain. For a healthy level of new supply there will have to be a change in appetite but with many newer schemes emphasising phased development there is bound to be a lag in implementation.

“As predicted for some time, this leaves the ingredients for high quality refurbishments as being the most likely stop gap solution.”