London is the city with the most number of commercial properties to let

Figures from the Office of National Statistics (ONS) show a monthly decline in the number of new UK commercial construction work undertaken by the private sector, since December 2017.

Looking at the overall picture, the results of the British referendum have been detrimental to the commercial property sector with the number of constructions continually decreasing.
When it comes to the capital, the estate advisory organisation Colliers claims that 90% of London office availability is constituted by second-hand product, while new/refurbished availability is down by over a third in the past year.

As a result, commercial property experts Savoystewart.co.uk analysed the number of commercial properties available to let in 20 of the biggest cities in the UK.
The figures were extracted from property website Zoopla for the month of November 2018. The cities were then ordered from highest to lowest.

The cities with the highest number of commercial properties to let in November 2018 were:
London (6,137), Derby (822), Birmingham (724), Manchester (501) and Leeds (481).
As expected, the city with the highest number of commercial properties to let was England’s capital city London, which showcased a whopping 6,137 properties in November 2018 available for businesses to rent.

This comes as no surprise giving the reputation London has as one of the world’s leading financial centres and as the “city of opportunity” according to recent analysis by PwC.
Simultaneously, the cities with the lowest number of commercial properties to let across major cities in the UK in November 2018 were:
Preston (153), Coventry (145), Belfast (145), Edinburgh (133) and Newport (128).

Surprisingly, Scotland’s capital city Edinburgh illustrated the second lowest number of commercial properties on the market to let (133). And although Edinburgh’s figures seem to be less intriguing than anticipated, it seems Scottish commercial real estate has experienced a bounce back, with a total return of 1.7% in the third quarter of 2018; a 1.4% rebound in the second quarter.