While the county's office market was not saddled with the scope of corporate givebacks as in previous quarters, several large tenants in White Plains did put space back on the market in the first quarter. Cushman & Wakefield reports that Alliance Capital returned 21,000 sf at 925 Westchester Ave., and Evergreen Financial, a unit of First Union, returned 42,000 sf at Parker Corporate Center (1311 Mamaroneck Ave.).

The downtown White Plains market had been hit with a number of large corporate givebacks in late 2001. Since then, like the county overall, it has begun to bounce back. The office vacancy rate for White Plains at the end of the first quarter of 2002 stood at 22.1 percent, down from 23.2 percent at year-end 2001. However, it is still considerably higher the 17.9 percent rate posted at the end of the first quarter of 2001.

Krasnow says that he expects the Westchester County office market will continue to see activity from internal growth as well as from relocations in the months ahead.

"Westchester County has the ability to attract companies from Manhattan and from lower Fairfield County alike," Krasnow says. "We're already seeing some of that relocation taking place. That trend should continue during the second quarter and throughout the year."

Another sign that the market has at least stabilized from the downturn of 2001 is that the county's average asking rent for direct (A and B) space remained unchanged from year-end 2001 at $29.03 per sf. Downtown White Plains posted the highest direct average asking rental rate for Class A space at $30.58 per sf in the first quarter of 2002. The city's average asking rent for both A and B office space stood at $29.54 per sf at the end of the first quarter of this year.