Central London Office Lettings June 2019

Central London office lettings in June 2019 reached 1.05 million sq ft, from 64 mid-large size office transactions (5,000 sq ft+) during the month. The June 2019 deals volume figure is in line with the current monthly London average of 1m sq ft.

June was characterised by 15 office deals over 20,000 sq ft, which were led by Parliamentary Estate’s 97,000 sq ft deal at 64 Victoria Street, SW1; Smith & Williamson taking 87,000 sq ft at 40 Gresham Street, EC2; Squire Patton Boggs taking 61,000 sq ft at Devonshire Place, EC2 and WeWork taking 47,000 sq ft at Hounsditch, EC3.

Professional Services topped the table of lettings by sector, compiled by Metropolis, underpinned by the Smith & Williamson and Squire, Patton Boggs pre-lets. This was followed by financial services led by Liberty and Business Research. The Business Services sector was also prominent with deals to WeWork, Spaces and Knotel

Office deals ‘under offer’ in central London rose to 4m sq ft, and pending deal volumes are healthy in nearly all sub-markets, with a number of deals in solicitor’s hands.

By area, the City accounted for 40% of the office floorspace let in May 2019 at 406,000 sq ft. The West End saw 356,000 sq ft of take-up. Docklands 66,000 sq ft, Midtown contributed 134,000 sq ft of lettings and Southbank 93,000 sq ft. Current London office demand is calculated to be around 3.8m sq ft in the City and 3.1m sq ft in the West End.

The volume of grade A (newly built or refurbished office space) let during the month, reached 349,000 sq ft sq ft (33% of the monthly total), as transactions for new space maintained the recent strong showing. Availability is dominated by secondhand space in all London markets.

Across Q2 2019, there were deals covering 3.3m sq ft of office space, slightly down on 2018, led by the EBRD pre-let at 5 Bank Street in Docklands, followed by Brewin Dolphin in the City and G-Research in the West End. Some 40% of space let in Q2 was in pre-lets. Financial and business services were the two most active sectors.

Metropolis research is currently monitoring 620 ‘live’ London office requirements, including a large volume of requirements from the banking and finance sectors, with pending deals for space of up to 1.5m sq ft due to sign in the next few months.