Not only are Millennials migrating to the Washington metropolitan region’s urban core, it seems that businesses are, too, in a reversal of the decades-long trend of businesses moving out of the central city to outlying counties.
Vacancy rates have risen in Washington, D.C., due to the contraction of legal services and government contracting tied to federal government spending. But according to commercial real estate firm JLL, private-sector tenants from Maryland and Washington accounted for 300,000 square feet of new leasing activity in the District. Reports Virginia Business magazine:
Doug Mueller, a senior vice president at JLL, noted that the migration is heavily populated by associations, technology companies and professional services firms. “The quality and location of office space with easy access to mass transit, abundant amenities and housing options also has a visible and tangible impact on attracting and retaining top talent,” he said in a statement.
According to JLL’s Office Insight report for the third quarter, since the start of 2014, a total of 21,200 private-sector office jobs have been added to the metro D.C. economy.
In an office market with tens of millions of square feet of space, 300,000 square feet is a rounding error. What’s significant is not the volume of space being occupied — although 21,200 office jobs is nothing to sneeze at — but the trend: jobs migrating back to the urban core. For decades, Virginia enjoyed a huge competitive advantage over the District with its dysfunctional government, poverty, crime and decaying neighborhoods. Now, despite bad schools, high taxes and expensive real estate, D.C. has something that educated Millennials and the businesses that employ them are looking for — walkable urbanism.
Next question: Is this trend unique in Virginia to the Washington metropolitan region or is it occurring in Hampton Roads, Richmond and the smaller metros as well?
— JAB
