The office sector in India saw a strong recovery in demand in 2022, despite being marred by some uncertainty arising out of the global economic disruptions. The sector recorded gross office leasing of 51.6 million square feet (mn sq ft) of space in 2022, a rise of 36 percent year-on-year (YoY).
Going forward, demand for commercial space could continue to grow, as 60-65 percent of all employees are estimated to return to office during the year. This is thanks to an increasing number of companies pursuing a return-to-office policy.
“The big trend that we are likely to see in 2023 is normalisation. We will see normalisation of return to offices as well. We will see higher percentage of employees returning to work (office) and that may be as 60-65 percent of the pre-pandemic levels,” Viral Desai, Senior Executive Director, Knight Frank India, told reporters at the launch of Knight Frank India’s 18th edition of its flagship half-yearly report – India Real Estate: 2022 – which presents an analysis of the residential and office market performance across eight major cities for the July-December 2022 (H2 2022) period.
He also said that India-facing businesses are likely to take up more commercial space in 2023 rather than global businesses.