DETROIT—Throughout much of the Midwest, suburban office tenantshave been migrating into the CBDs, and the Detroit region has certainly seen its share of thosetransfers. But according to third quarter researchjust published by Newmark Grubb Knight Frank, thistrend has subsided, at least for now. And overall, the metroregion's office market continues to see a falling vacancy rate anda relatively healthy pace of absorption as its recovery continues.

“The office vacancy rate for the metro area fell 90 bps, to21.8%, during the third quarter of 2014 as just over600,000-square-feet was absorbed,” the report says. NGKF officialswere not available for comment by press time.

The suburbs seem to have built up a little momentum after a longslide. In fact, the Southfield submarket posted the highestabsorption figures. The town's vacancy rate fell 200 bps, and justover 310,000-square-feet was absorbed. The big number was largelydue to Oakland County College's move into NorthPark Plaza at 17117 W. Nine Mile Rd. Blue Cross Blue Shieldof Michigan and other companies moved out of Southfieldand into the CBD in 2011, helping to send the vacancy rate to morethan 31%. But so far this year, the submarket has seen nearly500,000-square-feet of positive absorption and the vacancy rate,now at 25.7%, fell 4.1 percentage points.