Why is market data so hard to pin down? Different brokerages using different methodologies plays a part

At the halfway point of the year, Cushman & Wakefield offered some encouraging news on the much-debated health of Manhattan’s office-leasing market. The firm reported that the 15.4 million square feet leased through the first six months represented a 13 percent increase from the same time last year.

But then Avison Young released its first-half report saying that leasing activity was actually down 14 percent year-over-year. That’s an almost 30-point spread between what one brokerage determined was a slumping market and another saw as robust.

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