A rendering of the Bloc
The 2.2 million square feet of retail in the Greater Downtown Los Angeles submarket saw 3.1 percent vacancy in the second quarter, according to a report by CBRE. It clocked in lower than the 5 percent Greater Los Angeles average.
However, the area saw negative absorption of 29,943 square feet. And there is a large quantity of retail space that will soon become available: a whopping 344,138 square feet is under construction.
Downtown’s under construction mega-projects contributed to that figure. Greenland’s 2.1 million-square-foot Metropolis project will have 70,000 square feet of retail, while Beijing developer Oceanwide’s $1 billion project, Oceanwide Plaza, will have more than 166,000 square feet of stores and restaurants.
Asking rent averaged $2.33 a square foot a month in the second quarter, lower than the $2.40 Greater Los Angeles average.