Real Estate News 
Floorspace is proud to present our Q3 2022 update on notable office leasing activity in Vancouver, British Columbia.
We’ve highlighted First Movers over the past quarter – companies who have made a commitment to move, sublease, expand their footprint or renew their leases.
As reported by CBRE, Metro Vancouver’s overall office vacancy rate increased by 30 bps to 6.6% for the first time in four quarters. Downtown Vancouver vacancy sits at approximately 7.1% (Q2 7.2%) with 6.1% vacancy in the suburbs (Q2 5.5%). Over the past quarter 33,000 SF of space was absorbed on a net basis, with approximately 180,000 SF of negative absorption in the suburbs.
Metro Vancouver continues to hold its place as the office market with the lowest overall availability rate in Canada at 7.1% – less than half of the national average around 16.9%.
Three large office projects are planned to be delivered through the end of 2022 and into 2023. While a large portion of this space has been leased, these office buildings – including Oxford’s The Stack (1133 Melville Street), GWL’s VCII (733 Seymour Street) and Bosa Waterfront Centre (320 Granville Street) – will add an additional 1.3 million square feet to the Downtown Vancouver market.
Follow along with Floorspace as we highlight notable leases that are completed in each quarter.
Notable Leases in Downtown Vancouver – Q3 2022
1. Canaccord at 1133 Melville Street // The Stack
- Committed to 98,000 square feet, relocating from their current space at 609 Granville Street
- Brand new building under construction – soon to be tallest office tower in Vancouver
- Read more about the AAA quality office project with high-end amenity offering
- Property owned and developed by Oxford Properties
2. Productboard: Product Management Software at 411 Dunsmuir Street
- 12,000 square foot sublease, in a building owned by a local family
- Omicron Projects completed a heritage rehabilitation and expansion of the building in 2014
- Previously the space was occupied by Morneau Shepell, who is now known as LifeWorks and recently acquired by Telus for C$2.3B in September 2022 – here
3. Ansys Canada at 1095 West Pender // Manulife Place
- Approx. 21,000 square feet
- Ansys is an American company based in Pennsylvania with over 320 locations worldwide. They develop and market CAE/multiphysics engineering simulation software
- Property owned and managed by Manulife Real Estate
4. Aritzia at 411 Railway Street
- Cushman & Wakefield reported that the Vancouver based company leased ~88,000 square feet
- The project will be one of the first new buildings under the recently created I-4 Zoning District (Historic Industrial) , which saw the introduction of a new use labeled “Creative Products Manufacturing”
- Once complete, the project will span 6-storeys with 3 levels of underground parking and nearly 112,000 square feet dedicated to restaurant, manufacturing and office space.
- The building is split into two structures connected through multiple mass timber bridges
- Property developed by famed designer Niels Bendtsen (Bensen / InForm – founded in 1981 in Vancouver, Canada)
5. Colliers at 1066 West Hastings & 1067 West Cordova Street
- Colliers is moving all operations from 200 Granville Street, the building they’ve occupied for decades
- Committed to 47,000 square feet at Oceanic Plaza at Oxford Place for their property management team
- Committed to 31,000 square feet at Shaw Tower for their commercial brokerage operations
- Oceanic Plaza is owned and managed by Oxford Properties
- Shaw Tower is managed by Westbank Corp
6. Archiact Interactive Ltd. at 510 Seymour Street
- Approx. 12,000 square foot sublease
- Archiact Interactive is a Vancouver-based Virtual Reality (VR) Game Studio that has been developing new gaming experiences since 2013
- The property was sold earlier this year by Nonni Property Group to Canadian Urban Limited
Notable Leases in Vancouver Periphery – Q3 2022
7. Lululemon at 1523 West 3rd Avenue
- Approx. 30,000 square feet
- Office previously occupied by Bardel Entertainment, who has moved to Cressey’s 425 West 6th Avenue
- Lululemon also recently committed to a new lease for 120,000 square feet at Burrard Place
Notable Leases in Vancouver Suburban – Q3 2022
8. Nintendo at 4402 Skyline Drive // Solo District
- Approx. 14,500 square feet in the Brentwood neighbourhood of Burnaby
- Property developed by Appia Developments
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The information above was obtained from sources deemed reliable (including quarterly reports from CBRE, Colliers, Cushman and Wakefield & NAI), however, its accuracy cannot be guaranteed. Square footages are approximate.
