All Good New in the London Commercial Property Market

The strong recovery in the central London office market has reached an interesting stage with major developments going ahead as vacancy rates fall.The buoyancy of London clearly belies the doomsayers who had forecast a steady decline in the UK capital’s top role in the panoply of global financial centres. That has not happened, despite all the huff and puff about China running the world. From this follows a number of questions:

• Can London keep the pace going and maintain that global leadership?
• Will the dynamic of London’s improvement work its way around the country and help the major provincial cities to their own sustained recovery, as usually happens?
• Will the government’s spending cuts undermine this improvement?
• Can the infrastructure in London cope with continued expansion since it is already showing signs of inadequacy?

One clue to the future course of events is provided by CB Richard Ellis’ report that revealed London’s dominance in the cross border investments in 2009 and the first half of 2010 when it accounted for 27% of the total.

In fact the recovery had, not surprisingly, been substantially lower than during the boom periods in the market with an overall decline in investment of 70%.London emerged as the world’s most international market with buyers from 27 different nationalities. A few major cities dominated the international investment scene.

As far as the UK national scene is concerned, research form Colliers International shows that the amount of vacant retail floor space in London is almost five times lower than the rest of the UK with a two tier market in which London outperforms the rest of the country. Colliers’ Sarah Banfield commented: “We believe that the Central London vacancy rate is likely to continue to fall over the next six months and it will maintain its resilience in the face of the upcoming challenges.”

The London Commercial Property Register

The London Commercial Property Register is a leading UK business property publication from Martin Austen Publishing. The aim of the publication is to offer a simple and effective means of finding Offices Space in London, Serviced Offices in London and commercial property in London. You can also find the latest commercial property news for the London region.