Against the background of a near-zero vacancy rate in the warehouse market of the St. Petersburg agglomeration, rental rates have reached record levels – with VAT and operating costs, renting one square meter per month now costs 1,000 rubles or more. For many companies, such rates are critical, so they have to either reduce the occupied space or vacate the premises. At the same time, Nikoliers experts note, the increase in the cost of renting warehouses will continue at least until the end of the year.
Over the past 12 months, from the first quarter of 2023 to the end of March 2024, the weighted average rental rate for ready-made vacant Class A warehouse blocks in St. Petersburg increased by 44%. According to analysts, excluding VAT and operating expenses, landlords request an average of about 730 rubles per square meter per month.
At the same time, the monthly payment, including operating expenses and VAT, in St. Petersburg has already exceeded 1,000 rubles/sq. m/month, although a year ago it was possible to rent a class A warehouse for 700-750 rubles/sq. m/month.
“Today we can state that the psychological threshold of 1,000 rubles per square meter per month has been overcome. And we do not see a ceiling for the rate increase. Even now, there are often situations when, during auction processes, the rental rate for particularly attractive blocks increases to 1200 rubles,” notes Kirill Evening, senior consultant at the Nikoliers Warehouse and Industrial Real Estate Department. —Tenants who have signed lease agreements at acceptable rates until the end of 2022 with a moratorium on unilateral termination feel more confident. Those who signed short-term contracts with the right to extend were not lucky: now the owners of warehouse facilities offer additional agreements with a rate that is critical for many companies. Therefore, tenants have to either reduce the occupied space, or vacate the premises, which are immediately rented by other companies. This is how a large volume of transactions is ensured in a virtually scarce market.”
Such a dynamic growth in rental rates is due to a number of factors, the key of which is a decrease in the volume of vacant space. By the end of the first quarter, the share of vacant warehouses remains at a near—zero level – 0.4%. According to the calculations of Nikoliers analysts, at the moment only 18 thousand square meters are available for rent in the St. Petersburg agglomeration, with a total ready-made offer of about 4.8 million square meters. At the same time, the supply of sublease space has been completely washed out to date.
According to Nikoliers forecasts, the St. Petersburg warehouse market will not come out of deficit at least in the next year or two, despite the active commissioning of new facilities. In the first quarter of 2024, more than 119 thousand square meters of warehouse space were completed in the agglomeration, but they were not brought to the open market. For example, the transport and logistics complex from the Admiral group on Volkhonskoye highway with an area of 69 thousand square meters was fully leased by Ozon at the end of last year, and the SKRAP Bugra warehouse with a size of 27 thousand square meters was built for the needs of a wholesale supplier.
Recall that vacancy in the St. Petersburg warehouse market has been at a near-zero level for four quarters. However, despite the shortage of available space in 2023, the volume of demand in the region’s market set a new record: in total, more than 966 thousand square meters of high-quality warehouse space were sold, of which 44% were built-to-suit transactions.
Источник: www.bsn.ru
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