Companies are still renting office space in the Minneapolis-St. Paul market. It’s just that many of these companies are closing leases for less than 5,000 square feet, resulting in office leasing volume here that’s still far below pre-COVID levels.
That’s the latest from Avison Young, which recently studied the Twin Cities office leasing market. In its report, Avison Young said that leasing activity in the Minneapolis-St. Paul office market in the first quarter of 2025 came in at 32.9% below this market’s average leasing volumes from 2015 through 2019.
The interesting part? The number of office deals signed during the first quarter of 2025 in the Twin Cities market was just 2.3% below pre-COVID levels.
The change in the market since COVID? Tenants are more frequently signing smaller office leases.
According to Avison Young, while the leasing volume and number of deals signed in the first quarter by mid- to large-space users remain below pre-COVID levels, small-space users targeting office deals of less than 5,000 square feet have signed nearly 7% more deals and have taken just 5.7% less space, nearly in-line with pre-COVID levels.
As Avison Young says in its report, a higher number of small office leases have kept deal activity close to pre-COVID levels in the Minneapolis-St. Paul office market while the amount of leased space here has fallen significantly from 2019.
