CHICAGO-The bifurcation theme of the US office market continued into the third quarter, according to Jones Lang LaSalle’s recent report, as core areas such as New York City and Washington, DC lowered vacancies and raised rents, and secondary markets continued to struggle. However, though significant job growth hasn’t emerged, JLL says it seems that companies are gaining back confidence, and hiring may soon follow.

There was good news in Q3, JLL says, as US office space absorption reached 8.8 million square feet, compared to 2009’s negative net absorption of 60 million square feet. Sublease space has fallen for the fourth consecutive quarter, declining by more than 3.1 million square feet, and falling by more than 12 million square feet since September 2009.

Of course, the core markets lead that positive charge. CBD vacancy closed at 15.9%, but vacancy in the suburbs shot up to 20.4%. John Sikaitis, JLL’s Americas office research director, says atypical industries are still the top moving tenants, including education, energy and the federal government, areas where New York City and Washington, DC shine. However, he says technology firms have also increased activity, boosting cities such as San Francisco and Austin, TX.

Sikaitis tells GlobeSt.com that there have been some positive indications of new activity. “Though leasing activity is usually slow in the summer months, we tour velocity increase by 66%, and leasing increase by 6.2%. This is a sign that corporations are more confident in their business, we see that in the profit announcements on Wall Street and the amount of company cash on hand, the highest it’s been in decades.”

Along with more mergers and acquisitions, these are signs that the market is starting to turn, he says. “Instead of the two-to-three year leases we saw companies signing during the past two years, firms are now making more long-term real estate decisions. They’re also starting to hire again, though we won’t see it in jobs reports for a few months. We expect that job growth will come,” Sikaitis says.

However, he cautions that the “Tale of Two Markets” theme will continue at least for the next two years, as the core cities improve and the secondary cities lag. Manhattan is on target to end the year with positive absorption for the first time since 2007, but cities such as Chicago, Boston, Philadelphia and Dallas still have some submarkets that haven’t fully recovered from the downturn of 2001. “In the core markets in 2011, we may see rents spike as tenant leverage decreases, especially with no cranes in the air,” Sikaitis says. “The secondary markets, they may see 20-25% vacancy for the next 24 to 36 months.”