We all know that Austin is a tech town. Now a new report by commercial real estate giant CBRE shows that high-tech software and services jobs make up about a quarter of the office-using workforce.
While those of us in the tech industry might not be surprised, consider that Austin's tech workers only made up 16 percent of the office-dwelling population in 2011.
That news came out of a new data analysis by CBRE, which found Austin ranks No. 6 among the to 30 tech markets, in terms of office space usage and growth.
“One of the unique aspects of the Austin market is that the office sector development cycle this time around has been very controlled,” Troy Holme, executive VP at CBRE in Austin, said in a news release. “Despite high demand, we are not seeing much office space being built on spec. Instead, office developments often have a pre-leasing commitment (20-50 percent leased) before they break ground and are at stability (90-100 percent leased) when they deliver to the market. In this environment, as landlords continue to do well, they keep pushing the envelope of higher rents and fewer concessions.”
But Austin's office rent growth isn't as many of its peers in Atlanta, Los Angeles, California, Seattle, Denver and Washington, D.C.
A report by the Computing Technology Industry Association last year showed that the tech industry employed 113,176 people in Austin in 2016 -- or about 12 percent of the workforce. That was second only to San Jose's tech workforce on a per capita basis.
