Still, the DFW's industrial market remains "in the Top 10 for all the major institutional investors," Thomas O. Pearson of Cushman & Wakefield of Texas Inc.'s Dallas office tells GlobeSt.com. Institutional investors are still buying and developers are still building, although the pace has slowed somewhat. And industrial brokers like Pearson are still cutting deals.

The 2002 pipeline isn't as full as it was at this time last year, but the industrial market has picked up some steam in the past 30 days, Pearson says. "I'm encouraged by the number of companies that tell me they have plans to expand or relocate next year," he confides.

Pearson's optimistic about the coming year, perhaps more so than others in his specialty. That optimism is strong despite Q4 numbers that show the lowest net absorption of the past three quarters. C&W research shows warehouse net absorption at just below 1.7 million sf in the final quarter of the year. In comparison, a bit over two million sf was absorbed in the third quarter and more than 3.5 million sf in the second quarter. For office-showroom space, it looks pretty grim with the region posting in the negative for three consecutive quarters: about 1.2 million sf for Q4; 930,471 for Q3; and about one million sf in Q2.