Despite the home office boom as a result of the corona pandemic, rents for office properties in Germany continue to rise.
According to the Office Real Estate Monitor 2022 published on Monday by the German Economic Institute (IW) and the project developer Preig, office rents increased by an average of around 5 percent last year and thus slightly more than in 2020. The study examined price developments in 71 major cities and their surrounding communities.
The main reason for the stable development is probably that between June 2020 and June 2021 the number of office workers subject to social security contributions increased by 250,000, according to the study.
The growth in mobile working, on the other hand, has had only minor effects on the office real estate market so far, “also because companies have to keep more distance when designing workplaces and because many companies are waiting to move until after the corona pandemic,” the IW experts wrote .
Overall, according to the study, office rents rose in 80 percent of the cities surveyed.
The highest rent increases were in Bremerhaven in 2021 with an increase of 14.6 percent.
Rents also rose above average in Potsdam, Münster and Leipzig.
In contrast, there were significant declines in rents in Regensburg and Ludwigshafen.
According to the study, the areas surrounding the seven most important real estate locations – Berlin, Düsseldorf, Hamburg, Frankfurt, Cologne, Munich and Stuttgart – have seen disproportionately high increases in rents.
This could indicate that companies are increasingly looking at cheaper offers away from the city centers.
For the current year, the experts anticipate a stable development of the office market.
However, the sharp rise in energy prices could lead to a split in the market, with the result that rents for buildings with high energy efficiency will rise, while those for buildings that have not been renovated will fall or stagnate.