New Delhi moves up from 9TH to 5TH position in the list of world’s mosr expensive office markets

Track2Realty: India continued to feature in the list of World’s most expensive office markets, with New Delhi (Connaught Place – CBD) moving up from 9th position to 5th position (with an overall occupancy cost of US$ 183.30)according to CBRE Global Research and Consulting’s semi-annual Prime Office Occupancy Costs survey.

Mumbai on the other hand continues to drop further. The current report lists the city’s CBD – Nariman Point at 25th position. In July Mumbai was at 20th position. The latest survey provides data on office rents and occupancy costs as of September 30, 2012.

Anshuman Magazine, Chairman and Managing Director, CBRE South Asia, says, “In prime CBD Locations the supply of space is extremely limited with almost no new supply expected in the near future. This is specially true for quality office space which has led to occupancy cost remaining high.

The dominance of Asia-Pacific in the top 10 most expensive business locations worldwide continued, led by Hong Kong-Central – the world’s most expensive market – and five other Asian markets. However, it was a U.S. market, San Francisco (Downtown),that had the strongest year-over-year increase in prime office occupancy costs with a 36.4% rise driven by that market’s hot technology sector.

Hong Kong Central led the “most expensive” list with overall occupancy costs of US$246.30 per sq. ft. per year. This topped London’s West End, which had total occupancy costs of US$219.81. Tokyo (Marunouchi Otemachi) was the third most expensive market for office space, followed by Beijing’s CBD and New Delhi’s CBD. Other Asia-Pacific markets in the top ten include Beijing-Finance Street (6^th) and Hong Kong-West Kowloon (7^th).

Despite economic headwinds, occupancy costs increased by an average of 2.1% worldwide over the past year, led by the Americas with a 5.2% annual increase and Asia Pacific with a 2.6% increase. EMEA continued to be hindered by economic recession in much of Europe and recorded a 0.4% decrease in prime occupancy costs. Prime office occupancy costs increased in 74 markets, decreased in 37 office markets and had no change in 22 markets.

CBRE tracks occupancy costs for prime office space in 133 markets around the globe. Of the top 50 “most expensive” markets, 19 are in EMEA, 18 are in Asia-Pacific and 13 in the Americas.

While comparisons in dollars are affected by currency exchange rates, annual percent change calculations are based upon occupancy costs in local currency and not influenced by currency changes.

Top Ten

Most Expensive Markets

(In US$ per sq. ft. per annum)

Rank	Market	Occ. Cost

1	Hong Kong (Central), Hong Kong	246.30
2	London – Central (West End), United Kingdom	219.81
3	Tokyo (Marunouchi Otemachi), Japan	197.27
4	Beijing (CBD), China	184.95
5	New Delhi (Connaught Place – CBD), India	183.30
6	Beijing (Finance Street), China	179.57
7	Hong Kong (West Kowloon), Hong Kong	174.13
8	Moscow, Russian Federation	172.82
9	London – Central (City), United Kingdom	131.76
10	São Paulo, Brazil	130.07

Largest Annual Changes

Occupancy Costs

(In local currency & measure)

Top 5 Increases

Rank	Market	% Change

1	San Francisco (Downtown), U.S.	36.4
2	Jakarta, Indonesia	28.7
3	San Francisco (Peninsula), U.S.	28.6
4	Seattle (Suburban), U.S.	21.8
5	Beijing (Finance Street), China	19.7