Manhattan Office Leasing Grew 23% Year-Over-Year in April: Colliers

April showers bring more office leases. 

Office leasing in Manhattan came in at 3.4 million square feet in April, a 23 percent jump compared to last year, according to the latest Colliers (CIGI) data. That leasing volume was also 25.4 percent above the 10-year monthly average of 2.7 million square feet for the borough.

However, April leasing activity dipped slightly month-over-month, which isn’t surprising considering how wildly active March was.

“There was a slight dropoff from March, but March was a really unique month,” said Frank Wallach, executive managing director with Colliers. “April as a stand-alone … that was a healthy month.” 

Most of the activity in April happened in Midtown, where 1.8 million square feet of office space was leased, the Colliers data showed. Downtown had the least activity, securing 285,027 square feet. 

Some of the largest deals of the month included new leases by Amazon, which took 330,000 square feet at 10 Bryant Park. But April also saw plenty of relocations. That includes Goodwin Procter taking 244,000 square feet to move to 200 Fifth Avenue, Apollo Global Management inking 96,000 square feet to relocate to 590 Madison Avenue, Amalgamated Bank grabbing 94,000 square feet in a move to 99 Park Avenue, and Benesch Friedlander Coplan & Aronoff signing a lease for 90,000 square feet as it relocated to 1301 Avenue of the Americas. 

“It’s interesting that the top five deals were fueled by tenant relocation,” Wallach said. “And as demand was healthy, it was coupled with the availability rate continuing to tighten.”

The overall availability rate in Manhattan for April was 15.7 percent, compared to 18 percent in April of last year. Broken down by submarket, the availability rate was 14.4 percent in Midtown, 15.8 percent in Midtown South and 18.5 percent in Lower Manhattan. In the same areas last year, the availability rates in April were 16.1 percent, 18.4 percent and 21.5 percent, respectively. 

“We’re now at the lowest availability rate in Manhattan since February of 2021, so more than four years, and we’ve had positive absorption for 10 consecutive months,” Wallach said. “So the big picture is the overall Manhattan market has seen almost 30 million square feet of additional supply since March 2020.”

Asking rents went up in each of the three areas Colliers analyzed. Overall, the average asking rent for office space in Manhattan in April was $74.30 per square foot, versus $74.10 per square foot in April 2024. In Midtown, Midtown South, and Downtown, rents were $80.50, $77.60, and $58.40 per square foot in April, respectively. Compared to the same month last year, rents in those areas were $78.50, $80.50 and $57.30 per square foot, respectively. 

Overall, there is healthy demand for office space in Manhattan, and that momentum could continue in May and through the remainder of 2025, resulting in one of the strongest years for Manhattan office leasing in decades. 

“There is still very much a pipeline of large deals that could continue this healthy demand. But it remains to be seen exactly how May will shake out,” Wallach said. “The degree of change that’s possible from one month to another is incredible. Just from pure mathematics, if demand mimics for the rest of the year how it did for the first four months of the year, you would have almost 47 million square feet of demand, and that would be the strongest year of leasing since 2000.”

Amanda Schiavo can be reached at aschiavo@commercialobserver.com.