Downtown markets that are home to a high concentration of high-tech firms posted some of the highest increases with San Jose behind Boston at 588%, San Francisco came in next at 420.4% and Seattle at 285%. While this area's huge increase is surprising, Ross Moore, vice president and director of research at Collier's, emphasizes two factors that contributed to Boston's seemingly sudden jump in sublease space.

First, there is a misconception that Boston's Downtown area did not have that many tech firms. "Clearly," "that is not the case." he tells GlobeSt.com. Moore also notes that percentage increases don't always paint a complete picture. Because this area's fundamentals had kept the market in good shape through the end of last year, the numbers now indicate a sharper contrast than in other markets, where the downturn had impacted those markets much earlier. "Boston was starting from a low base," he says. "In the year-end 2000 numbers, Boston was not even starting to slide yet while San Francisco had already started to slide by then."

According to Moore, these numbers are probably the most dramatic change this area is going to see. "I don't think we're going to see much worse," he says, but quickly adds that while we won't see these same numbers, things are not going to get significantly better for a while. "Things have picked up in the last six weeks compared with the first three months of the year but it's still pretty quiet around here," he notes.