Singapore CBD Grade A office rents record largest increase since Q3 2023

Rents grew by 1.5% YoY in Q1 2025.

In a recent report, Savills said as the occupancy levels of Singapore CBD Grade A office buildings are healthy, rents remained firm. Thus, the average monthly rents of overall CBD Grade A offices in Savills basket rose for the fourth consecutive quarter by 0.4% QoQ to S$9.83 per sq ft in Q1/2025. This was a slightly lower increase compared to the 0.6% in the previous quarter.

On a YoY basis, office rents grew 1.5% in the first quarter of 2025, the largest YoY increase since Q3/2023 when rents rose 1.7%.

Here’s more from Savills:

A quarterly increase was observed for all A-grades of office buildings in the CBD. While the growth momentum slowed down for Grades A and AA buildings in the quarter, rents of Grade AAA buildings rose by a larger 1.1% QoQ to S$13.05 per sq ft, in comparison to the 0.7% in the previous quarter. This was the largest QoQ increase since Q2/2023 when rents rose by a similar magnitude. The rent of S$13.05 per sq ft was also the highest since Q4/2019 when rents reached S$13.12 per sq ft.

Rents of Grade AAA buildings have been on the rise for four consecutive quarters, which can be evident from high occupancies of such buildings and previously vacated spaces being filled up relatively fast. The low vacancy levels of the premium buildings has motivated landlords to maintain or even increase their asking rents.

For Grade AA buildings, office rents continued to increase for the third consecutive quarter by 0.3% QoQ to S$10.75 per sq ft in Q1/2025, moderating from the 1.0% in the previous quarter. Rents of Grade A office buildings also rose for the fourth consecutive quarter by 0.2% to S$8.70 per sq ft.

On a YoY basis, rents of Grade AAA office buildings saw the largest growth, with a surge of 2.7%, the highest YoY increase in a quarter since Q3/2023 when rents rose 3.1% YoY. Similarly, rents of Grade AA and A buildings rose 1.7% and 0.9% YoY respectively in the quarter.

Across the submarkets, no QoQ rental change was observed for CBD Grade A offices in Beach Road/Middle Road, Orchard Road and Shenton Way in Q1/2025. For Orchard Road, this was the fifth consecutive quarter that rents have remained constant, standing at S$8.98 per sq ft.

The remaining micro-markets registered QoQ growth between 0.3% and 1.4%, with the largest growth coming from Marina Bay with a 1.4% QoQ increase in office rents to S$13.00 per sq ft, the highest since Q4/2019 when rents in the micro-market reached S$13.12 per sq ft. This was the fourth consecutive quarter of increase after two consecutive quarters of contraction and this quarterly growth in Q1/2025 was higher than the 1.0% in the previous quarter.

As most of the Grade AAA buildings are in Marina Bay, the tight occupancies of these buildings brought about the strong growth to the micro-market. Compared to Q1/2024, almost all the micro-markets recorded rental increases, excluding Orchard Road which saw no rental movement. The other micro-markets had YoY rental growth ranging from 0.8% to 3.0%, and the largest YoY increase was from Marina Bay.