RCA in the commercial property press:

Creative Spaces: An Emerging Trend

Bloomberg reports: Workers roam with laptops, meet on sofas and scribble on walls at Facebook Inc.’s new Silicon Valley headquarters, where rusted steel beams, exposed heating ducts and plywood-covered corridors are part of the decor.

The office campus in Menlo Park, California, was renovated for $250 million in a “hacker” style intended to express the culture of the world’s largest social-networking company.

While most companies don't efficiently use their offices, technology firms are leading the wave of an emerging trend-redesigned office space using nooks, kitchens and stairways as places where workers can meet on the fly.

“Creative space” is outperforming other property types, said Dan Fasulo, managing director of global property research firm Real Capital Analytics Inc., citing a Moody’s Investors Service index of prime buildings in six major cities with tech sectors. The measure gained almost 33 percent from its low two years ago, more than double the 15 percent advance for the broader commercial property index.

“They’ve seen their value skyrocket,” Fasulo said of the properties tracked in Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco and Washington. “A new generation of corporate leaders is looking at space-planning as a core part of business to increase productivity and keep people in the office. The old guard looked at it as an expense.”

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Posted by: Nina Turner

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