Patrick Kelly, managing director of Grubb & Ellis|Commercial Florida in Tampa, said the Office Trends Report – an in-depth quarterly survey of office leasing and sales activities from Manatee County to Polk, including Hillsborough and Pinellas submarkets – showed positive absorption of office space in one Pinellas submarket and in all but one of the Hillsborough submarkets during the quarter.

"Market activity has clearly picked up,” Kelly said.

"It's too early to call this a trend and the net numbers are small, but second quarter results fall on the positive side of the chart for the first time in the past 10 quarters,” Kelly said.

Positive absorption results when total square footage leased by tenants outpaces new construction. The Second Quarter Grubb & Ellis|Commercial Florida Quarterly Office Trends Report found only one major project under construction – an 88,000 square foot facility in the northeast Tampa submarket.

The Tampa Bay region posted an overall vacancy rate of 19.5 percent, up slightly from the first quarter results. Vacancy rates range from a high of 40 percent in the Pinellas County Bayside submarket, to a promising 10.6 percent in South Tampa. Tampa's Central Business District posted a vacancy rate of 19.7 percent and Tampa's Westshore submarket posted 21.9 percent vacancies.

Developers typically look for sustained vacancy in the 7-10 percent range before planning new construction, and that will take some time.

"But there's a lot of silver lining,” Kelly explained. "Tenants are value shopping. That's a big step forward. Some of them are relocating, a sign of market velocity,” he said.

Kelly said the spread between historical rents and discounted rents is luring innovators into the market.    "Especially in Class B and Class C facilities, we're seeing entrepreneurs come back into the market with new business plans,” Kelly said.

"These startups are the underpinning of our entire economy and we need to nurture them with appropriate incentives,” Kelly said.