Office take-up falls in Lisbon and Porto in Q4

Take-up in the office market in Portugal’s two main cities, Porto and Lisbon, fell in the last quarter of 2020.

In Lisbon take-up was 27% down than in 2019. In Porto the fall was 17% compared to the previous year, reports Diário Imobiliário.
According to the Office Flashpoint report from real estate consultants JLL, the take-up rate in Lisbon was 142,000m2 for 2020 as a whole, down 27% on 2019 (around 194,000m2).
In Porto, the fall was 17% compared with the previous year (around 65,000m2), with an annual take-up rate of 54,000m2.
With regard to the number of operations, Lisbon saw a fall of 39% to 106 deals closed throughout the year, while Porto shrank by 18% to 50 operations.
In both markets, however, the average take-up area per operation exceeded the average of the previous year, with 1,340m2 in Lisbon and 1,080m2 in Porto.
Mariana Rosa, Head of Leasing Markets Advisory at JLL explains: “Naturally, a more mature market like Lisbon, where take-up levels are more robust, reflects the impact of the pandemic in a more expressive way and the increase in teleworking from home, with lots of companies putting off their decisions to rent or expand their office space, especially when it comes to large office spaces with big areas.
“The Lisbon market has, since May, shown a trend to contract and the year closed with the corresponding balance that we had expected.”