Market Data
Weakness in Rents Beginning to Show
March 17, 2008
Over the past 24 months, rental rates in the Silicon Valley, the Peninsula, and San Francisco have all seen a dramatic increases. Rental rates in some buildings have jumped nearly 75% over the past 24 months thanks to aggressive new owners looking to benefit from increased demand.
During the past two quarters however, that trend has [...]
Short Term Rates Down, Long Term Rates Up, Economy Down
March 17, 2008
The Fed’s recent actions to help stabilize economic conditions are not impressing foreigner’s holding US debt instruments. The inflationary actions of the Fed have resulted in foreign buyers of US debt to essentially boycott government auctions for treasuries.
Over the past eight weeks, the share of foreign buyers participating in these auctions was somewhere around 25%. [...]
Cornish & Carey Predicting a Flat 2008
February 22, 2008
Cornish and Carey held its annual forecast in Santa Clara this week. Along the lines of what I’ve been writing about, they are predicting rental rates to be static for 2008 for office and R&D, and vacancy rates to remain in a similar state.
The fact is that there is a large amount of new space [...]
San Francisco Office Space Leasing Slows
February 4, 2008
Faced with a possible downturn in the economy, tenants seeking space in San Francisco returned to the sidelines in the fourth quarter. 2007 saw a number of large deals take place including 200K for Google and 170K for O’Melveny & Myers. Rents also saw an uptick in 2007 overall, but that trend seemed to have stalled in [...]
Read More >>Microsoft Bids For Yahoo; Facebook Numbers Leaked
February 1, 2008
Microsoft has launched a $45B unsolicited bid for Yahoo! Combined, the two would be a more formidable competitor to Google, both in terms of search market share, as well as ad inventory. What will be interesting to see is that if the acquisition is indeed successful, to what extend Microsoft will embrace open-source technologies and [...]
Read More >>Q4 2007 Leasing Figures Not as Rosy
January 11, 2008
According to research put out by CBRE’s research team, overall vacancy rates in the Bay Area increased from 8.6% to 9.7% in the fourth quarter. The peninsula and San Francisco have remained strong while the East Bay has suffered some.
In the south bay the lowest vacancy rates were in Mountain View, Palo Alto, and Cupertino, [...]
S&P’s First Week Performance Worrisome
January 4, 2008
If the performance of the S&P Index during the first week of January is right again this year, the markets and the economy may be facing a bumpy ride ahead.
Below is the performance of the S&P 500 index over the last ten years; and 2008 has had the worst showing in a decade. We’ve been [...]