Annual rental growth on prime office assets across the 110 major markets covered by the JLL Global Office Index decelerated to 2.3% in Q4 2016, down from 3.0% in Q3 and the slowest rate of full-year growth in three years. Quarter-on-quarter, rents rose by 0.4%, mirroring the pace from the previous quarter.
Further deceleration is expected during 2017 as more markets move into balance. While global leasing volumes are forecast to be broadly stable on 2016 levels, new deliveries will peak this year and the global office vacancy rate will trend slowly upwards over the next 12 months. Many more markets will be trying to absorb a greater volume of new deliveries and, with occupiers keeping a close eye on costs, prime rental growth is set to soften further to around 2% for the full year.