Guadalajara, Jal. The demand for parks and industrial buildings throughout the country due to factors such as the attraction of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), the growth of E-commerce and the relocation of production chains due to nearshoring, places this real estate sector as the booming nationally this 2023.
“At the national level we already see vacancy rates or availability of square meters or industrial buildings for immediate occupation, less than 4%, even close to 3%,” said the former director of the Association of Industrial Parks of the State of Jalisco (APIEJ), Javier Lemarroy.
“Yes there is a shortage; Despite this, there are states that still have a considerable number of square meters available, such as Nuevo León and Guanajuato, and thanks to that they are taking all the marbles; they are receiving more companies because they have space to place them immediately. Right now what is decisive is the time factor, ”he added.
According to Lemarroy, the states with the highest availability of industrial spaces in Mexico are Guanajuato with 5.07% vacancy, followed by Nuevo León with 2%, Toluca (State of Mexico) with 1.8% and San Luis Potosí with 1.02 percent.
In contrast, the cities with the lowest vacancy rates are Tijuana with 0.4%, Jalisco with 0.2% and Chihuahua with 0.1 percent.
Lemarroy Mendoza commented that since the demand for industrial parks has had sustained growth from 2008 to date, “the preferences of all investors, institutional and non-institutional investment funds, family offices, etc., are going to place investment in the real estate sector of industrial parks. This is not only because of a fashion or a trend, but it is backed by an absorption”.
Jalisco case
When detailing the case of Jalisco, the former director of APIEJ said that in 2019, before the pandemic, the rent of industrial spaces amounted to 280,000 square meters; In 2020, in the midst of the global health and economic crisis, 394,000 square meters were consumed; In 2021, with the arrival of more logistics companies, including Amazon and Mercado Libre, as well as the expansions of Fedex and DHL, in addition to the growth of the distribution centers of different companies, the rent of industrial spaces amounted to 601,000 square meters. squares.
“By that time, we had already had a considerable slowdown in construction in Jalisco for almost a year and a half. In 2022, we closed the year with a rental activity of around 447,000 square meters taken and, as they colloquially say, what was sold is over, ”he deepened.
For this reason, he explained, at the beginning of 2022 the availability levels were at 2.1%; for the second quarter they fell to 1.1%; in the third quarter only 0.2% was available and the year closed with 0.1% vacancy.
“The inventory in Jalisco of industrial parks is made up of 4.2 million square meters; We have 340,000 square meters under construction that are in the construction completion phase, but fortunately and pushed by the lack of supply, we see a lot of pre-leasing,” he said.
