Nashville Office Market Report

Flight-to-quality apparent among law firms. Nashville was one of four secondary U.S. office markets to record vacancy compression over the past year ending in March. The recent performance of its CBD and close-in submarkets is largely to credit. Spanning the past 12 months, availability in Downtown Nashville dropped 130 basis points on net absorption of 560,000 square feet. In nearby Greenhill-Music Row, vacancy fell 70 basis points to roughly 15 percent. In both areas, midsize and multi-floor commitments by law firms and select financial advisors are driving leasing activity, with most executions involving newer-built space. This dynamic has positive implications for the metro’s active pipeline and overall fundamentals, as the two areas and the adjacent West End collectively account for 35 percent of the metro’s vacant stock.