Wangjing office rent drops most

(Reporter Cao Zheng) Since last year, the supply of office buildings in Beijing has increased, and the rent has decreased continuously; This year's epidemic has also stimulated the demand for flexible office. Many enterprises have reduced the rental area. Owners with weak pressure capacity have started the "discount season" to attract tenants.

With fine decoration, furniture and good vision, in Wangjing SOHO, an office space of more than 260 square meters is being rented at the price of 5 yuan per square meter per day. "In the past, the rent of Wangjing SOHO was about eight or nine yuan, which has decreased a lot in the past two years, and became more serious during the epidemic," said Zhang Ping, a broker of an office leasing company. Rongke Wangjing Center, which has a longer building age, also experienced the process of rent dropping from 7 yuan to 5 yuan. Under the epidemic, Wangjing Business District has become one of the most obvious areas for rent reduction. According to the data obtained by the reporter from Savills, the rent of office buildings in Wangjing Business District has been reduced by 7.5%, ranking first among the major business districts in Beijing.

This is happening in many business districts in Beijing. 2019 is considered to be the "turning point year" of the Beijing office market. Last year, a total of 1.345 million square meters of new supply was added to the Beijing Grade A office market. Massive supply directly increased the vacancy rate to 12.7%, the highest since 2009. Data shows that in the first quarter of this year, The vacancy rate of CBD reached a high of 12.5%, the vacancy rate of the Asian Olympic Business District reached 37.8%, and the vacancy rate of Lize Business District reached 68.2%.

In the case of increased supply, the flexible office mode of enterprises has also led to a decline in demand for office rental. CBRE's recent survey shows that more than 90% of Chinese mainland enterprises work at home during the epidemic. In the long run, the epidemic may lead to changes in tenants' working habits. About 73% of the respondents said they would increase the use of flexible office, and another 70% said they would increase investment in science and technology to support remote office plans in the future.

In the past two months, Ms. Wang, a white-collar working in a technical equipment sales company in Deshengmen, came to the company only one day a week on average, and worked at home the rest of the day. In case of important meetings, most of them are solved through video conference. At present, the company has begun to consider reducing the office space leased.

"Affected by the epidemic, most of the leasing activities in the Beijing office building market in the first quarter had to be suspended or put on hold. Key indicators such as rent and absorption continued to weaken, and both owners and tenants were facing certain operating pressures." Lin Shuo, Department of Commercial Buildings in North China of Savills, said.

However, there are still two major business districts in Beijing growing against the trend. Financial Street and the core area of Zhongguancun have good tenant stickiness. The vacancy rate in the first quarter of this year is still relatively low, 2.1% and 3.7% respectively. "These two business circles are supported by the Internet technology and finance industries." Lin Shuo disclosed that even though the market is poor, the rent of the two business circles in Financial Street and Zhongguancun core area still rose 1.5% and 1.4% respectively in the first quarter.