The latest numbers from the company indicate 41 per cent more office space rental activity within the City of London during the second three-month period of 2012 than in the same period a year earlier.
“In the context of the current eurozone financial crisis, the City figures were encouraging, with take-up spread across a broad range of occupier types,” said Dan Bayley, BNP Paribas Real Estate’s managing director in London.
Looking more generally at the central London office market, the advisory firm’s experts described rents as having held firm during the three-month period being analysed. Rental values right across the city reportedly remained slightly unchanged in the quarter despite the ongoing struggles of the British and European economies.
Expectations are that renting activity will slow, at least to some extent, over the rest of the summer throughout London, partly due to the city hosting the Olympic Games. However, BNP Paribas’ London experts noted that there are several significant office space deals in the pipeline across the city that could yet close in the third quarter of the year.
An increasingly important area of London for office space activity is the district just north of the City referred to as the ‘Silicon Roundabout’ near Old Street. A growing number of start-up tech businesses are being supported there during the early stages of their development by major international companies like Google and Facebook.
Editor’s notes: In Q1 2024, Central London’s take-up of office space through leasing deals reached 1.5 million sqft, and 903,000 sqft of office space was leased in the City of London.