Pressure to provide quick delivery of electric machinery, jewels, pharmaceuticals and other products has fueled demand for airport-adjacent warehouses and pushed rents in those submarkets to sizeable premiums, according to a new report from CBRE.
An analysis by CBRE found that average rents for warehouses within a five-mile radius of major airports are 18.8 percent higher than the average for their metropolitan areas. The analysis spanned the 20 busiest U.S. airports for airfreight.
“The immediacy of e-commerce deliveries and the generally faster pace of business than in past decades, among other factors, have made airport warehouses a critical link in many supply chains,” said John Morris, CBRE Americas President of Industrial & Logistics. “Rents for these properties will continue to exceed their market averages for the foreseeable future.”
| Market | Avg Rent Within 5 Miles of Airport | Premium Over Metro-Area Rent |
| Los Angeles County | $23.02 | 36.8% |
| New York Boroughs | $32.35 | 34.6% |
| Miami-Dade | $13.33 | 24.6% |
| Chicago | $7.73 | 23.5% |
| Philadelphia | $10.00 | 23.5% |
| PA I-78/I-81 Corridor | $7.35 | 18.5% |
| Dallas/Fort Worth | $6.80 | 10.7% |
| East Bay, CA. | $12.74 | 6.7% |
| Louisville | $5.15 | 4.5% |
| Cincinnati | $5.05 | 4.3% |
CBRE found that the largest share – 42.7 percent - of leasing activity in airport-warehouse markets so far this year was done by third-party-logistics companies. That’s a greater share than 3PLs claim of overall U.S. warehouse leasing, 35.6 percent. The reason: Shippers, retailers and other companies often hire 3PLs to handle shipping of small-lot goods via high-cost airfreight.
The second largest share of leasing activity near airports went to general retail and wholesale companies at 32.2 percent. Food and beverage companies are a distant third at 5.2 percent.
