"I think we're starting to see some traction at the high end of the class A market," reports Gil Dailey, senior director at Cushman & Wakefield, who handles the Downtown market for the firm. "Typically, that's where you see the start of a recovery, then it trickles down into the B and C markets. We've got a ton of activity, especially at International Place, where they're starting to push their rents."

The C&W report pegs the overall vacancy rate at 14.6% for the Boston CBD office market, up a tenth of a percentage point from the previous quarter. Meredith & Grew's numbers are higher at 16.3% based on 56,836,819 sf, but the sample is nearly three million sf lower than C & W's, which tracks 59,520,866 sf.

"Sixty million is not an unusual number," explains Bob Cleary, president of the Codman Co., whose firm puts the number at 13.2% on about 50 million sf. "They're tracking the lower end property types, and we don't track the C space and the smaller properties." Cleary adds that the standard deviation for such reporting is usually 1% to 4 %.

While activity was sluggish at the beginning of the quarter in Boston, a number of good-sized deals closed late, and the second quarter is starting off with a bang. First Marblehead took 100,000 sf at One Beacon at the beginning of the quarter, and at the end of March, Pearson Education added 120,000 sf to bring their total to 225,000 sf at 501 Boylston St. and United Way relocated to 51 Sleeper St. at 50,000 sf. The second quarter has opened with a flurry of signings, led by Investors Bank and Trust, who inked a 10-year, 350,000-sf renewal at John Hancock Tower last week, and will either add or renew for at least 150,000 sf at Copley Place, according to sources.

Another possible tenant at Copley Place is Houghton Mifflin, which was reportedly seeking over 200,000 sf and is rumored to be close to a deal to relocate from 222 Berkeley St. Babson Capital Management inked a deal at Independence Wharf last week for nearly 84,000 sf; Kirkpatrick and Lockhart have signed a letter of intent to relocate from 75 State St. to One Lincoln St. for more than 100,000 sf; and Elkus Manfredi Architects announced a move from 530 Atlantic Ave. to 39,000 sf Harbor Corporate Center at 300 A St. Time Warner Book Group has also signed a renewal for 67,000 sf at Two and Three Center Plaza.

The key words here, however, are relocate and renewal, according to brokers. While the signings are no doubt good news for Downtown's landlords and brokers, they are doing little to positively affect the absorption rate for Greater Boston. "The velocity is there, but they're still trading spaces," says Joe Sciola, managing director at Cresa Partners. "The velocity is being driven by lease expirations, and the tenants are trying to taking advantage of the bottom of the market for the next four to five quarters. Its not really affecting positive absorption, and it's not going to have any effect on rents increasing."

Further complicating the absorption problem is the amount of sublease space. Both Cushman & Wakefield and Meredith & Grew report about 2.4 million sf of available sublease space, with more on the way. The merger of Proctor & Gamble and Gillette is expected to put another 400,000- to 500,000 sf on the market. Spaulding & Slye Colliers, which already has the assignment for the sublease space generated by the Manulife-John Hancock merger, is rumored to have the inside track for the Prudential Center sublease space assignment created by the merger.