INDIANAPOLIS-Developers added a remarkable amount of space to this metro area's industrial inventory in 2015. But in 2016, there was largely a pause in construction as everyone waited to see how well the market absorbed all of the new buildings. Last year turned out to be one of Indianapolis' best ever in terms of net absorption, and that has set the stage for 2017, according to a new report out from Colliers.

“What happened was exactly what we were hoping would happen,” Jason Speckman of Colliers tells GlobeSt.com. Tenants absorbed almost ten million square feet of space in 2016, a big leap over the results from 2015, when they had absorbed 3.5 million square feet. And another 1.4 million square feet was occupied in this year's first quarter alone. “This has kicked off an entirely new wave of construction.”

Overall, developers had more than 5.2 million square feet of new space underway at the end of the first quarter, much of it in bulk distribution facilities and more than twice the amount completed in all of 2016. The data also show that the leasing of new speculative space has pushed the overall vacancy rate down to 7.6%.