Dublin’s priciest street: How much is the rent?

Grafton Street in Dublin is one of the most expensive main streets in the world.

Most global capitals, including Dublin, can boast of having their own main street full of luxurious shops, restaurants and filled with different vibes.

Dublin’s Grafton Street, built in 1708 by the wealthy Dawson family, came 13th in the 2019 Cushman & Wakefield Main Streets Across The World ranking. If we focus on Europe, the street is then the 11th most expensive street when it comes to retail rents.

The retail rent in 2019 is at €3,794/m²/year, which means it remained the same as the year before. Though Grafton Street, one of the two main streets in the Irish capital, was the eighth most expensive street in this regard a decade ago.

Iconic Grafton Street

“Recent activity has been focused on Dublin, with the majority of openings being Food & Beverage across the prime high streets and major shopping centres,” Cushman & Wakefield wrote about Ireland’s retail rents market.

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The nowadays car-free street started as a residential street. Only after O’Connell Bridge was built across River Liffey in the 18th century, the street began to boom economically. Strollers can still find the iconic Brown Thomas department store, opened in 1849, and famous café Bewley’s here.

Retailers are, nevertheless, rumoured to be considering reducing a number of their stores, Cushman & Wakefield warned.

The lowest rents in Africa and Macedonia

Comparing Dublin’s Grafton Street  with other capitals, we can observe that the retail rent here is almost seven times lower than on Causeway Bay in Hong Kong. The 2019 rent stands at €25,965/m²/year there, which is an increase of 2.3 percent.

Causeway Bay is followed by Upper Fifth Avenue in the USA at €21,295 and London’s New Bond Street. A retail rent on this London street is as high as €16,222/m²/year.

However, the most massive prices increased were on Sydney’s Pitt Street Mall, by 17.9 percent compared with 2018. Conversely, the lowest retail rent prices are in Africa.

In Europe, Makedonija Street in Macedonia’s capital of Skopje offers out retail premises the cheapest, at slightly over €300.

Cushman & Wakefield tracked retail rents across 68 markets in 2019, involving 448 locations.