Will There Be An Office Shift To The Suburbs?

In an article by Sougata Mukherjeee, Editor-in-Chief of the Triangle Business Journal in Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina, he wirtes that GICPte  and Workspace Property Trust just spent $1.1 billion on purchasing 53 suburban office buildings  “That’s a bet that reflects institutional investors believe remote work is here to stay, and now office buildings near residential neighborhoods should become more desirable.”. He goes on to reference Kastle Systems, that tracks how many workers are returning to the office, that the figure is now 45%, only slightly higher than last year. “Based on that survey alone, companies are beginning to accept the fact that they may never have all their workers come to the office five days a week.”  He also cites a recent CBRE vacancy report that shows downtown vacancy rates are now higher than suburban for the first time in decades. I agree with part of this premise, that long-term all workers are not going back to the office. However, work-from-home does not necessarily mean work from a suburban office, and in my region with a 20-30% suburban vacancy rate and limited tenant activity we have yet to see companies moving to the suburbs.