Brokers Say Fairfield County Showing Signs of Improvement

C&W says the county's office availability rate fell from 20.7% at year-end 2002 to 18.5% at the end of 2003. CBRE reports that the county's office availability rate fell by more than one percentage point to 17.5% at year's end. Both firms were optimistic that the improving economy will help to begin to shore up Fairfield County's struggling office market in 2004.

"The leading indicator of an improving real estate market is job creation," says Jim Fagan, senior managing director and head of C&W's Fairfield and Westchester County, NY region. "Companies in 2001 and 2002 were focused on cutting costs. Today, business managers across the board are being asked to grow their businesses."

Dean Shapiro, senior managing director of CBRE, says that the Fairfield County office market seemed to perform in lockstep with the recovery that took hold in the national economy in 2003.

The major hubs of leasing activity continue to be in Greenwich where financial service firms and hedge funds gobbled up space and the greater Norwalk area, which has seen its share of large lease transactions. Several weeks ago, FactSet Research signed a 126,000-sf lease at 601 Merritt 7 and CB Richard Ellis states that Diageo appears poised to conclude its mega-deal at Building and Land Technology's Merritt River Campus in Norwalk.

While both brokerage firms note that Greenwich and Norwalk are thriving, they also agree that the city of Stamford continues to struggle. Stamford's office availability rate rose slightly from 17.9% a year ago to 18.6% at year's end 2003, according to Cushman & Wakefield. CB Richard Ellis on the other hand states that the availability rate in downtown Stamford fell almost a point and a half to 16.3%.

CBRE officials say Stamford now resembles the harsh market conditions that existed in the city of White Plains, NY in the early and mid 1990s. Cushman says some Stamford property owners, who had hoped to build office projects are now reconfiguring their plans for other uses. For example, a 195,000-sf Target store in under construction on the corner of Washington Blvd. and Broad St. in Stamford, a Burlington Coat Factory is also being built on the corner of Summer and Broad streets in Stamford, while two supermarkets and a Courtyard by Marriott are also planned for downtown parcels. In addition, CB Richard Ellis reports that a multi-storied building at the "Hole in the Ground" site next to the Stamford Town Center will eventually feature WalMart and Sam's Club stores.