New Jersey has erased nearly 10 million square feet of office space from its inventory over the past five years — not because demand for real estate has disappeared, but because demand for office space in particular has shifted, and older buildings are no longer passing muster.
That’s the core finding of a new JLL report on office redevelopment across northern and central New Jersey, according to Steve Jenco, vice president and director of New Jersey research at JLL. Jenco discussed the report’s findings during a recent podcast with Real Assets Adviser, noting that the changes reflect a market working through inventory built for a different era of work.
“Historically in New Jersey, most of our market, from an office standpoint, was developed in the 1980s or so,” Jenco says. Those buildings were designed around floor plates and tenant needs that have since changed, he says, and while some owners have renovated and reinvented their properties over the
