Despite there still being four months left until the end of the year, 2022 is already the best of the last 10 years in the capital's office segment, reveals JLL's Office Flashpoint. According to the report, the Lisbon office market is going through “the best moment ever”, registering until August an accumulated occupancy of 207,300 square meters (m2).

Sofia Tavares, JLL's Head of Office Leasing, told idealista that “over the year, an average of 25,000 m2 of offices were negotiated per month in Lisbon”. “Maintaining the pace that we have seen so far, the occupation by the end of the year has conditions to exceed 230,000 m2”, she says.

“We have no expectation that the market will lose momentum. The demand is very high and is very directed to large areas. The only challenge to absorbing more space has been the lack of capacity on offer to respond. Hence, a good part of the business is based on a future occupancy model, with several pre-lease and self-occupancy operations”.

According to the August Office Flashpoint, the Parque das Nações is the most sought after area (32 percent of the accumulated take-up) and Financial Services companies are those that took up the most space.

In Porto, August was a month with little activity, with around 1,000 m2 occupied, of which 63 percent were in the CBD-Boavista area. In accumulated terms, the Porto market totals 33,400 m2, a volume that exceeds by 30 percent the volume absorbed in the same period last year.

“There is no shortage of demand in Porto, where we feel a lot of pressure from companies looking for new offices. In this market, the imbalance in terms of supply is even more evident, which has led to more contained growth. But there are several new projects coming to the market and next year will be particularly important for the take-up of Porto”.