Austin Sublease Glut Sticks as Major Tenants Offload Space

9 September 2025

Austin’s office sublease market is still loaded, even as availability has ticked down from last year’s peak. Companies across tech, insurance and healthcare are pushing millions of square feet back onto the market, giving tenants bargain options while keeping pressure on landlords.

Roughly 4.4 million square feet of sublease space is available in the city, down from 4.7 million a year ago, according to CoStar. Seven listings alone account for more than a third of that total, spanning over 1.7 million square feet, the Austin Business Journal reported.

The biggest chunk comes from Meta, which pre-leased the entirety of Sixth and Guadalupe’s office space in late 2021 but never moved in. The company is marketing about 552,000 square feet after signing PricewaterhouseCoopers and another undisclosed tenant to partial subleases.

The other major offerings read like a who’s who of corporate retrenchment. State Farm is trying to offload 269,000 square feet at 8900 Amberglen Boulevard, while Superior HealthPlan has 216,000 square feet at 5900 East Ben White Boulevard in Southeast Austin that’s lingered on the market for more than a year.

At the Parmer Austin campus, at 13011 McCallen Pass Drive, 3M is seeking takers for a 204,000-square-foot lab-heavy property, while Home Depot is offering nearly 200,000 square feet at its former tech hub, which went remote during the pandemic.

General Motors has 170,000 square feet listed at its Parmer Lane tech center, at 717 East Parmer Lane, and Athenahealth is dangling 112,000 square feet at the redeveloped Seaholm Power Plant, at 800 West Cesar Chavez Street.

Vista Equity Partners is looking to sublease roughly 40 percent, about 79,500 square feet, of its future headquarters at The Republic, a 48-story office tower under construction at 401 West 4th Street in downtown.

The glut means discounted rents for tenants, along with turnkey buildouts and shorter commitments compared with direct deals. But subleases carry risk: if the original tenant walks away when its lease expires, subtenants can find themselves out of luck.

The scale of Austin’s sublease pool underscores the broader slowdown in the city’s office market. Net absorption has stabilized, and construction has cooled, but with big corporate retrenchments, vacancy is elevated. Landlords are competing not just with new supply but also with large, well-located blocks like Meta’s tower, which offer move-in ready space at steep discounts.— Eric Weilbacher