By David Ebro, president of Levey Group Despite the nearly 6.4 million square feet of new project starts during the fourth quarter of 2022, which grew the volume of Houston’s industrial space currently under construction to 33.5 million square feet, the market posted a record 30.3 million square feet of net absorption for the year. This activity drove Houston’s vacancy rate down to 3.8 percent — a decline of 220 basis points from the end of 2021. The remarkable growth throughout the Houston MSA — the nation’s fourth-largest metropolitan area — has developers racing to find buildable sites both within and beyond the city limits. As a result, industrial development is bulging out of the city and into submarkets such as Baytown, Richmond and Brookshire as developers pursue more economically feasible land among these growing population centers. Beyond favorable land opportunities, Houston’s outlying submarkets offer the workforces that tenants require for their warehouse and distribution operations. These growing submarkets are also generating an increasing amount of demand from e-commerce users in the consumer goods sector. Record Growth East of Houston Much of the industrial growth can be found east of town, near and along the Houston Ship Channel. For the …
