Dive Brief:
- The shared-workspace office sector continued to expand in the second quarter, with its national footprint growing to 166 million square feet from 141.29 million in the year earlier period, according to Q2 2026 and 2025 reports by CoworkingCafe, a unit of real estate technology provider Yardi.
- Pricing for cospaces was roughly stable with some variation: The median U.S. monthly cost of an open workspace and dedicated desk ticked down to $219 in the second quarter from $225 in the year-earlier period and the median hourly price of a meeting room held steady at $45, according to the reports.
- Peter Kolaczynski, director of commercial data at Santa Barbara, California-based Yardi, predicts continued growth in coworking spaces. “It’s still relatively small, but over the next five to seven years we see coworking being a bigger and bigger chunk of office space,” he told CFO Dive.
Dive Insight:
The U.S. coworking market has been growing steadily this year, helped by demand in mid-tier markets, with much of the growth in smaller-format spaces, CFO Dive’s sister publication Facilities Dive reports.
Flexible office space can be an attractive and less capital intensive option for freelancers and small businesses as well as corporations, which can use it to offer workplaces to remote workers without locking themselves into long-term leases, Kolaczynski said.
“You’re not paying big ticket items like tenant improvements and that’s the benefit,” he said, noting that the flexibility and lack of long-term commitment is the main draw. Still, while growing in popularity, coworking spaces made up just 2.34% of the nation’s office inventory, according to the report.
The pivot to more remote and hybrid work has slammed the U.S. office market and driven up vacancy rates in recent years, though they have begun to stabilize, CFO Dive previously reported. Kolaczynski said office buildings bought at lower prices are being repurposed, which can lead to lower prices for occupiers.
“We’ve seen a destruction in value for what an office space is worth across the board,” he said.
