Huntsville office spaces see uneven resurgence in interest and retention

National trends indicate that the rise of telework is hurting commercial real estate as an industry, leaving many office buildings empty. Here in Huntsville, this trend is a bit more shaky, as some areas across the city are seeing proportionally more workers returning to offices than in other areas.

Though telework has surged in popularity over the last four years, there is still plenty of demand for Class A and Class B office space in Huntsville. Within its portfolio, Freedom Real Estate has a vacancy rate of only 2%, according to Vice President Brenda Conville. 

Conville also stated that downtown commercial space has a vacancy rate of less than 10%.

Though she could not provide an estimate of Huntsville’s commercial vacancy as a whole, Conville said the rate would likely be skewed by vacancies in Cummings Research Park (CRP). Conville compared CRP’s current vacancies to those in the recession. 

“During the recession in 2000, up until maybe 2012 or 13, there was something around a million square feet of space available in Research Park. It was ridiculous, and they bounced back.…It got full again, and now it’s empty again. It’ll get full again.”

Real Estate & Business Development Manager John Roberts explained that companies’ reasons for moving their offices to new spaces like those in Redstone Gateway vary. That said, he indicated that slow growth is typical of Cummings Research Park and that the business is not in crisis.

“You see a lot of companies that were at Research Park historically, they’ve moved over to the [Redstone] Gateway for whatever reason. Maybe it’s visibility, just new space, etc., proximity to their customers, but some of CRP is now lagging behind. But it’s all cyclical,” Roberts explained.

Generally, Freedom Real Estate customers look for space due to growth in offered services and needs for classified meeting spaces and document storage. Roberts says he does not see the expanding need for office space growing disproportionately between industries, indicating even distribution of need for offices. 

Roberts also noted the popularity of mixed-use developments such as Hay’s Farm as well as multi-tenant buildings, which make up most of Huntsville’s office space. Conville added that the practicality of multi-tenant buildings is that when a tenant is lost, it frees up a much smaller part of a building’s footprint when compared to a single-tenant office building.

The smaller office space left behind also fills up significantly more quickly than a single-tenant building. Conville says a space in a multi-tenant building is likely to remain empty for 3 to 6 months whereas a single-tenant building would be without a tenant for 2-3 years. 

Overall, Roberts and Conville agreed that Huntsville’s commercial real estate industry is in a healthy state of growth across the board naturally as the result of Huntsville’s growth as a city. They assert that as companies continue to grow, they always have a need for office space. In addition to the need to fulfill contractual obligations to have office space, Freedom Real Estate clients say working in traditional office spaces provides invaluable opportunities for collaboration and mentorship among coworkers.

Brittany Able, Practice Lead of Government Services at Actalent, agreed that many employers facilitating remote work also feel a need to return employees to in-office work. Some employees, having worked remotely since the COVID-19 outbreak, are realizing fully remote work does not best suit their individual needs and workstyles. 

That said, to employees, the benefits of in-office work don’t always outweigh the practicality of working from home. Able explained that allowing more flexibility options such as unlimited PTO and options for standing desks in in-person working environments can help bridge the gap between those who enjoy the freedom of remote work and employers seeking to move back to in-person work.

Above all else, Able recommended that companies gauge interest among employees for different changes in office accommodations and dynamics.