Fewer premises empty than expected

The amount of retail vacancies on Dunedin’s George St is holding steady, yet to show much change despite the disruption of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Adam Binns Commercial Ltd director Adam Binns does a count of empty shops along three blocks of George St every three months.

The count on November 1 found little change from the August count, with overall three new vacancies and two new tenants.

"That is the interesting thing," Mr Binns said.

"When there’s been widespread predictions that vacancy is going to increase, nothing has happened, in spite of everything that is going on around the world."

Most of the change occurred in the Edinburgh Way block between Hanover and Frederick Sts where vacancy dropped 2%.

Mr Binns said the lack of change on George St could be resulting from many tenants simply waiting to see out their lease before possibly leaving or extending, or that they were performing better than expected.

He said the one vacancy that was clearly a result of Covid-19 was STA Travel, which was in liquidation.

The two newcomers to the street were a clothing store and a hairdresser, Mr Binns said.

That vacancies had not increased substantially was a good sign for Dunedin’s economy, he said.

"The feedback we get in a general sense is that everybody we speak to seems to be going all right at the moment.

"That can only be good for the local economy ... if people are busy they’re feeding into the economy."

jacob.mcsweeny@odt.co.nz