Office buildings within Chicago’s CBD are recovering faster than Chicago’s suburban offices

Chart shows the office busyness in Chicago CBD and Suburban markets from 2019 to 2024
  • Utilizing Avison Young’s new Busyness Index, an analysis of Chicago’s office building utilization during the month of June 2024 reveals that office visitation is 60.5% of pre-pandemic levels when compared to June 2019. This is slightly below the national average but above other peer markets such as Boston, San Francisco, and Philadelphia.
     
  • A deeper analysis based on geographic location within the market divulges that while the Chicago CBD’s office utilization was hit harder during the early portion of the pandemic these buildings have outperformed the market since 2022.
     
  • Conversely, the suburban office stock within the metro area had significantly higher utilization during 2020/2021; however, employees of companies within the suburbs have since stalled on returning to the office.

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