2017 was a very successful year for the offce letting market with take-up totalling 10 million m² in the main European markets. Volumes increase of 14% compared to last year represents by far the best result in 10 years.

Due to several deals greater than 10,000 m², Frankfurt (+47%) and Munich (+28%) recorded signifcant increases in take-up, while Hamburg (+13%) and Berlin (+8%) also set new records. Take-up grew (+11%) vs. 2016 in Central London where large occupier deals were 55% ahead of average levels. The volume of take-up was much higher than last year in Central Paris (+9%) also.

Most of European markets followed this healthy trend, particularly Dublin (+45%), Madrid (+29%), Warsaw (+28%), Milan (+19%) or Amsterdam (+16%). Only Luxembourg (-6%), Brussels (-8%) and Vienna (-42%) saw a decline in take-up.

The volume of vacant space dropped in the 4 largest German markets where only 3.16 million m² were available at the end of last year, 16% lower than in Q4 2016.

Vacancy also contracted in Central Paris, reaching 6.5% (-30 bps vs. 1 year ago) but the most important drop was seen in Bucharest (-410 bps), followed by Amsterdam (-230 bps) Warsaw (-300 bps), Lisbon (-160 bps) and Madrid (-160 bps).

In the Lisbon office market the trend will continue to be a compression of the availability rate, with the new offer very focused on pre-lease agreements.