Leasing activity in industrial market up 4.9% YoY in Q1 2022: Knight Frank

Strata industrial space remained popular among businesses.

The leasing activity in Singapore’s industrial market increased by 4.9% on a year-on-year basis in January and February 2022, according to real estate consultancy firm Knight Frank.

Daniel Ding, Knight Frank Singapore’s head of capital markets, said strata industrial space maintained its popularity amongst businesses because of its price quantum. 

However, said the pace of leasing movements slowed. The multiple-user factory segment posted 1,557 tenancies in the first two months of the year, representing a marginal decline of 0.4% YoY. 

Meanwhile, Singapore's economy went up by 7.6% in 2021, which was partially attributed to the growth of the manufacturing industry of about 13.2% year-on-year for the whole year, led by output expansions in all clusters.

But the worsening of Russia-Ukraine war might exacerbate the already constrained global supply chains, Ding added. This is even as there is a net weighted balance of 8% of manufacturers foreseeing a favourable business outlook in the first half of 2022, supported by the pace of growth in 2021.

With this, he said manufacturers may turn cautious when considering expansion activities as external forces aggravating the global semiconductor supply crunch.

On the other hand, e-commerce continued to be stable and was heightened due to economies shifting to digital, which could result in stability in logistics demand as well as warehouse space.