Curation Team
KOLKATA: The city witnessed highest growth in office rentals in the first quarter of 2025, alongside Hyderabad. According to the Knight Frank Report for Q1 2025, a total of 0.16 million square feet of office space was leased in Kolkata, reflecting a 16% decline compared to Q1 2024, which recorded 0.2 mn sqft leased.
Despite this decrease, the city’s average transacted office rents rose by 9%, reaching Rs 42/sq ft/month — the highest among the top eight cities, alongside Hyderabad. Rental growth in Bengaluru was 8%, followed by the NCR at 6%. Mumbai and Chennai registered 2% and 3% growth, respectively. The report also noted that average residential prices appreciated by 9% year-on-year to Rs 3,947 per sq ft.
As per CBRE report for first quarter of 2025, key transactions recorded during this period were that of Genpact leasing 50,000 sq ft in Godrej Genesis, Akasa’s 46,000 sq ft in Godrej Genesis and Standard Chartered’s 36,000 sq ft in Siddha Esplanade.
Sales of residential units priced between Rs 20–50 mn saw the highest year-on-year growth of 149%, increasing from 180 units in Q1 2024 to 448 units in Q1 2025. Meanwhile, units priced below Rs 5 mn remained the largest segment in Kolkata, comprising 41% of total sales, with 1,598 units sold in Q1 2025—the highest among all price categories.
Senior director of Occupier Strategy & Solutions at Knight Frank India, Joydeep Paul said, “The growing presence of India-focused businesses in Kolkata’s commercial market indicates a promising growth trajectory for the sector in the coming years.”
Credai Bengal president, Siddharth Pansari, said, “We have observed similar trends at our RDB Primarc TechPark. Rentals fell to historic lows over the last 4–5 years and were bound to rise, given the demand from GCCs and the overall infrastructure improvements made by the government.”
“The increase in office rentals also signals a positive shift towards greater office space consumption. At Merlin Group, we have successfully sold our office space in The Summit—the tallest office tower in Sector V. Additionally, we are developing Bengal’s first World Trade Center in Sector V and anticipate that top-tier brands will establish their offices in this prestigious World Trade Center,” said Saket Mohta, MD of Merlin Group.
