Norwalk's Merrit7 office park. Courtesy photo

Fairfield County office leasing activity plummeted 44 percent in the first quarter as corporate decision-makers held off on real estate commitments amid economic uncertainties in the COVID-19 pandemic.

The county registered nearly 56,000 square feet of negative absorption, and average asking rents were virtually unchanged at $34.34 per square foot, according to CBRE’s MarketView report.

“Leasing activity in Fairfield County was unusually slow in Q1 as the VOCID-19 crisis took a toll on the market in late March. This was the second-slowest quarterly total since 2007, with 56 percent less leasing activity than the five-year quarterly average,” the report states.

Only two leases over 20,000 square feet were executed in the quarter, including Image First’s 65,000-square-foot lease at 50 Commerce Drive in Trumbull and Forrester Research’s 23,789 square feet at 501 Merritt 7 in Norwalk. The median deal size declined 33 percent from the previous quarter to 3,016 square feet.

Total leasing activity totaled 272,093 square feet, down 44 percent from the fourth quarter of 2019. Suburban markets accounted for the majority of the quarter’s leasing activity, a departure from previous quarters which were led by central business districts.