The corporate space segment, one of the investment bastions of institutional developers and funds in the main world capitals and specifically in Mexico, saw the unemployment of their spaces increase considerably after the pandemic.

In part, the global economic slowdown that was not alien to our country, led the vast majority of companies to resize their costs and expenses, one of the main ones was the rent of the spaces they occupied.

With the current capacity limitations, which at the beginning of the orange traffic light were 20% and now with the recent announcement of the yellow traffic light it increases to 80%, the companies recalculated what they would need to keep their total operations in correct operation.

In addition to the new demands in terms of health, the densities decreased and the spaces were reformulated under the premise of housing a large part of them for common areas, where the technological component of connectivity, under parameters of healthy distance, would be the backbone of the design.

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With all these changes in process, the panorama of scheduled deliveries was exceeded by the number of spaces that were delivered in all the corridors of the capital.

Let us remember that net absorption in the capital at the end of the first quarter of the year was on negative ground with 170.8 thousand square meters, a sign that the number of vacant spaces significantly exceeded their gross demand.

Then we saw a close of 2Q 2021 where gross demand continued to be negative with 64.5 thousand square meters, where this indicator had already been declining.

We continue to advance towards the end of the third quarter of 2021 and the preliminary figures for the months of July and August give us an indication of a slope in unemployment that continued to soften. 

On the one hand, the bimonthly capital gross demand was 44 thousand square meters while the vacancies were 78 thousand square meters, which indicates a negative net demand of 33.9 thousand square meters.

The explanation stems from the fact that inventories are no longer fed at the same rate with spaces that enter unoccupied, and on the other hand, due to changes in uses that are already reflected in previously empty spaces.

Of interest: How are the real estate projects of Avenida Reforma progressing?

The transformations have been diverse from health, educational, housing, hotels and even some storage warehouses.

Some cases will be more profitable than others and everything revolves around the location, characteristic of the property and its state of construction, whether it is an old existing and disused building, a modern building in process or a property that was obsolete or unusable. in the wake of some of the earthquakes that occurred in Mexico City.

One of the most relevant examples in Mexico City has been the intervention of the capital government on Reforma Avenue to boost the economy with a highly employer sector such as construction.

If we review in detail the vacancies in the months of July and August, of the total of 78 thousand square meters, the majority are concentrated on the North, Reforma, Polanco, Santa Fe and Insurgentes submarkets that continue to lead with the largest number of spaces yet available, in absolute terms.

The results of September 2021 are still expected for the end of 3Q 2021, to make a relative comparison with the previous quarters, but it is already expected that the measures on the one hand of the developers and on the other of the government incentives are being reflected favorably.

Both demand and unemployment, although they still have a long way to go before reaching the parameters we saw 2 years ago, are generating a slight recovery outlook in this traditional investment sector.