At the end of August 2023, industrial vacancy at the national level remains at 1.7%, a percentage similar to that reported at the end of the second quarter of the current year.

With a figure that exceeds 1,520,000 square meters of vacant spaces in the main industrial markets of the Mexican territory, the northern and lower regions concentrate the vast majority with 46% and 36% of the total, respectively.

At the beginning of 2021, industrial vacancy in Mexico was 5%, and quarter by quarter it has been decreasing until reaching the current level of 1.7% at the end of Q2 2023. Below the national average are the vacancies in Mexico City, Monterrey, Saltillo, Tijuana, Reynosa Chihuahua, Puebla and Tecate, the latter market being the one that reports the lowest percentage with 0.6%.

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The four markets in Bajío are above the national average, along with  Ciudad Juárez, Guanajuato y Mexicalii, markets that report between 2% and 3.4%. However, even with these higher percentages, the availability of industrial spaces reaches its historical minimum levels.

In general terms, three factors influence the future behavior that this important real estate indicator could present: the increase in gross demand, the speed of incorporation of new constructions and the projections of increasing rental prices.

The levels of gross demand that reached one million 682 thousand square meters during Q2 2023 continue to put pressure on the national market, which in some regions is unable to generate sufficient supply both in quantity and characteristics to reverse the decline in vacancy.

We observe markets, mainly in the northern region and on the Mexican border, that have had multiple requests for pre-leasing, which means that these properties do not become part of the offer, as they enter the inventory occupied in that period.

Likewise, the demand from manufacturing companies with very particular space specifications in industries such as automotive and metalworking, as well as large-format logistics operations, lean towards their preferences for custom-made projects, which has also impacted vacancy in general. .

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Now, if we analyze the supply and the speed with which new constructions start and are incorporated, we observe a lower participation of speculative projects together with projects that do not start with enough time to adapt to demand, which determines that the decline cannot be reversed. in the vacancy.

The scenario of increasing rental prices, where macroeconomic factors such as replacement cost inflation are also added, completes the equation for an environment where tenants compete for the best spaces many times before they enter the market.

The simultaneous presence of these three factors will be the key that favors a greater downward adjustment in the industrial vacancy of the main Mexican markets.