Overheard a real estate agent talking about vacancy rates in downtown...

I was grabbing coffee at that place on Woodward near Campus Martius last week and overheard two agents talking about how office vacancy is now at 28% in the core downtown area. They said some landlords are dropping rent by $5 per square foot just to keep tenants. That got me thinking... are we gonna see a lot of those smaller shops closing up if foot traffic keeps dropping? Has anybody else noticed more empty storefronts around Grand Circus Park lately?

2 comments

2 Comments

barnes.shane8d ago

That line about landlords dropping rent by $5 a square foot is wild. If theyre already slashing prices that much, it means theyre getting desperate, which usually means the smaller retail spots are next. I walk by Grand Circus Park a few times a week and yeah, I've seen at least three places shuttered on the west side near the park entrance that used to be busy lunch spots. The problem is that if office workers arent coming back, those coffee shops and sandwich places lose their main customers, and lower rent on offices doesnt fix foot traffic overnight. It feels like we're heading for a bigger shakeout where a bunch of those little storefronts just vanish unless the city does something to get people back down there.

patel.leo8d ago

Maybe those places were barely hanging on before and the office exodus just sped up the inevitable.