The demand for future office spaces will be the function of two aspects:
1. The companies’ remote work policy (which may or may not lead to a lower GLA, depending on how it views the office’s place) and
2. Hiring. We will touch on the former as well, but it is important to note for now, the latter is no longer a negative issue.
We looked at surveys undertaken by the European Commission with regards to local companies’ short-term hiring intentions (next 3 months) in a variety of officeable sectors. And the news is mostly good, sometimes very good. We want to also note that such charts should be interpreted as giving signals ratherthan looking at absolute levels of one index or another compared to recent levels.
The market is very much in a wait and-see mode and it is still not clear where tenants might be heading in terms of office occupancy in the future. Our assertion is that while most will reduce their space, they will still hold onto the bulk of this, as the office of the future will feature more GLA per employee amid a much deeper focus on collaboration and creativity, as well as providing a certain amount of back-up space in case physical distancing is required.
