INDIANAPOLIS — On Wednesday afternoon Kenny Compton is detailing a clients car.
"I can go to their office, pick up their keys, clean it, fix it and bring it back for a small fee," said Compton.
Compton owns Auto Spa, a car detailing service located on the Carmel Gateway office campus. Business took a hit when many workers began working from home in 2020. However, in recent months, he’s seen signs of recovery.
“Before the pandemic, it was great, flooded with cars,” Compton said. “Now, I’m starting to see an increase. People are starting to come back to work.”
The increase in heading back to the office has Carmel Gateway looking for unique amenities to offer its tenants.
“They’re looking for things like convenience, community and amenities,” said Gallagher, the community manager at Carmel Gateway. “What we bring to the table is a lot of fun, food and fitness.”
The Indianapolis office market remains in recovery mode. The vacancy rate is currently around 22%.
"I’ve been in the business 26 years, so when I hear that number, it’s an improvement over a couple of years ago. It’s still high, higher than what we would like it to be," said Traci Kapsalis, executive vice president of leasing and sales at JLL.
Kapsalis says there's demand for new construction.
“The areas that have been really successful are the Bottleworks development downtown or in downtown Carmel. You can’t build fast enough for that space. It's leased well before it even finishes coming out of the ground."
Northern suburbs like North Meridian/Carmel and Keystone Crossing remain some of the most active and in-demand areas for commercial office space.
“Downtown Indianapolis is coming back more slowly,” Kapsalis added. “But projects like the redevelopment of Circle Centre Mall, there's some projects in the queue, I think as though materialize and get legs that helps."
