Telework and its Effect on Office Real Estate : A Study on Telework, its Future, and How Telework can Affect the Market for Office Space

Sammanfattning: The combination of growth in gross domestic product, population, and employment in an area usually implies a growth in demand for workplace properties, somewhere employees can carry out work. This, in combination with a deindustrialization process where more and more people shift to jobs within the service sector has historically fuelled the demand for office space in most across the western world, not least in Sweden. During the year of 2020, due to the ongoing pandemic many employees have been forced or encouraged to work from home, telework. With so many employees teleworking and many organisations reconsidering where work should be carried out, the importance and future of offices is questioned. The aim of this thesis was to obtain a deeper understanding of how increased telework will affect the office space market. In doing so, four research questions were formulated assessing the effect of telework on the office space market, the drivers and obstacles towards increased telework, and finally the Corona pandemic effect on the future of telework. The approach of finding evidence to answer research questions was interviewing real estate professionals, employers and employees, conducting a survey, and performing an extensive literature review on previous work surrounding the topic. The result shows that telework will likely lead to decentralisation of offices, increased demand for flexibility, changes in requested office design and eventually a somewhat weakened demand for office space. Result further shows that the main drivers towards increased telework were found to be the event of a crisis, improved results, development of information and communication technology (ICT), and improved work-life balance. The main obstacles were found to be social isolation, loss of organisational culture, and teamwork suffering. Lastly, results show that the Corona pandemic has served as a catalyst for many to realise the potential of telework while simultaneously helping many to realise the importance of the office as a meeting place. In conclusion, the Corona pandemic has pushed the change towards increased telework and possibly, we need to reconsider what is implied with work in our society.