Office development in Miami hit its highest level since 2009, thanks in part to tenants relocating from high-tax states.
Over the next two years, 1.9 million square feet of office space is expected to be completed, according to data from CBRE. That rise in new office construction is due to demand from corporations looking to grow their Latin American business, and tenants relocating from high-tax states, the Wall Street Journal reported.
Theodore Ward, chief of staff at Mana Group, plans to redevelop some of the properties Mana has purchased in downtown Miami to appeal to Silicon Valley firms that are looking for low-tax states with “a high quality of life with a business environment,” according to the Journal. The changes in the tax law in 2017 have already brought wealthy home buyers to South Florida.
The nearly 2 million square feet of office space in the pipeline is much higher than the under 500,000 square feet that was planned as of 2011. It’s equal to about 2.7 percent of Miami’s current office inventory.
New projects include OKO Group and Cain International’s 830 Brickell, a 57-story glass office tower where WeWork is leasing 146,000 square feet. The Brickell office building is expected to open in 2022.
Asking rents in Miami have surged since 2014, while vacancy rates have fallen. More than half of what is under construction has been leased, according to Christos Costandinides of the CoStar Group. [WSJ] — Katherine Kallergis