Dublin has seen a significant increase in office take-up during the second quarter of 2024, in what JLL Ireland has called “a significant turnaround” for the market after a tough start to the year.
At 919,000 sq ft of leasing deals, the city has posted a 125% rise in activity year-on-year and a 355% increase from the previous quarter, according to research from the agency. The quarter saw some of the highest levels of deal flow since the start of the pandemic, and the best quarterly performance since the final months of 2021.
The first quarter had been the slowest for Dublin deals since 2013 when the pandemic years of 2020 and 2021 are excluded.
The education, health and social sectors drove the rise, accounting for almost a third of overall activity. The tech sector also took a significant piece of the pie at around 25%. Stripe recorded the quarter’s largest leasing at One Wilton Park, taking 156,000 sq ft – almost six times larger than the previous quarter’s biggest lease.
Dublin 2, Dublin 4 and M50 South were the most active areas, with 54%, 27% and 10% of volume respectively.
Despite this burgeoning growth, the city’s vacancy rates are still elevated at 15.7%, or 14.6% once reserved space is accounted for. This figure is projected to rise as new office development projects reach completion.
Construction and refurbishment work is under way on a total of 3.6m sq ft across County Dublin, of which 1.6m sq ft is expected to complete in the second half of 2024.
Niall Gargan, head of research at JLL Ireland, said: “Following a challenging start to the year, the office market in Dublin experienced a significant turnaround in the second quarter, outperforming expectations. The leasing activity in Q2 was so robust that the volumes for the first half of the year came close to surpassing the entire annual volume recorded in 2023.”
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