Santa Barbara Office and Industrial Year End Review

Santa Barbara Office:

The Santa Barbara Office market remained stable during the 4th quarter of 2010. The quarter was highlighted by a Santa Barbara Asset Management leasing the entire 5th floor of 820 State Street (8,500 square feet). In another market an 8,500 square foot lease might be commonplace but of the 129 current available office spaces in Santa Barbara only 2 are over 10,000 square feet (901 Olive Street and 3660 State Street). The majority of office spaces in the South Coast larger than 10,000 square feet are located in Goleta. The typical office product in the Santa Barbara market further displayed by the fact that of the 18 new office leases during the 4th quarter in Santa Barbara, 14 were under 2,000 square feet. This represents a marked change as the small office market in Santa Barbara had been stagnant since early 2009. Look for this market to remain stable throughout 2011.

Santa Barbara Industrial:

The Santa Barbara Industrial market remains the most stable submarket we track with a vacancy rate of 1.2%. During the 4th quarter we saw a relatively high number of transactions for Santa Barbara industrial with 6 completed deals. These new leases were highlighted by Allied Waste leasing two separate buildings totaling over 13,000 square feet. With the high demand and limited product the Santa Barbara industrial vacancy rate has remained between 1% and 3% for over a decade. Look for industrial vacancy to increase slightly during 2011 as a number of larger spaces may be coming on the market. At the time of this writing there was only one industrial space on the market over 10,000 square feet. Of the 19 available spaces, 13 fell within the 2,000 to 8,000 square foot range.