Office leasing and investment activity slowed at the end of 2017, but the decline wasn't enough to cause investors to worry. The Olive Hill Group's Tim Lee says that the end of last year was slow, but not enough to cause major concern—especially considering market fundamentals. Now, there seems to be a turnaround. In January and February, deal volume and lease transactions have ticked up, and it is giving investors like Olive Hill Group a positive outlook on activity in 2018.

“Leasing activity was softer in the last half of the year, but I wouldn't say that it was a significant drop or any kind of perfidious drop,” Lee, VP of Corporate Development and Legal Affairs at Olive Hill Group, tells GlobeSt.com. “We did see that at the beginning of the year there was a pick up again, and there have been a number of requests from tenants for 10,000 square feet or larger. On the sale side, activity didn't pick up a the end of the year. Typically, at the end of the year, there is a huge flurry of deals that try to get in before the end of the year. That typically helps to drive deal volume up at the end of the year, but last year, we did not see that rush. Things took a breather, but it wasn't a big drop.”

While activity did slow at the end of the year—particularly on the leasing side of the equation—Lee says that his firm remained active through the end of the year, although there were fewer opportunities than usual. At the start of the year, the firm saw an increase in deal volume. “Last year at the end of December, we closed our 520 Broadway purchase, which was a big deal for us. So, we sere still busy,” says Lee. “We have also been working on deals that came to market in the first quarter of this year. We didn't see any significant slowdown for our company, but of course, we are just one data point.”