Rent at Pitt Street Mall in Sydney, Australia is among the world's most costly real estate properties, taking the fourth spot globally, according to global real estate adviser Cushman & Wakefield said in its latest report.

Cushman & Wakefield said Pitt Street Mall jumped from ninth place to fourth, with rents in the pedestrian street up 33.3% year-on-year following major redevelopments.

Pitt Street Mall is Australia’s busiest and most cosmopolitan shopping centres. It has more than 600 specialty stores all within two city blocks.

David Woolford, Cushman & Wakefield Managing Director for Australia, said the transformation of the Pitt Street Mall "has created a new super prime precinct characterised by larger footprint stores and an influx of high profile international brands."

"This has been confirmed with rents in the precinct consistently reaching $10,000 per sq.m, with some as high as $1,3000 per sq.m. The emergence of international brands including Zara, Bottega Veneta, Christian Louboutin and Diane von Fürstenberg has legitimised this new super prime precinct, as these retailers may have been willing to pay premium rents to secure a flagship location in the Australian marketplace," Woolford said.

New York's Fifth Avenue, where rents jumped by 21.6%, retained its spot as the most expensive shopping street in the world for 10 years.
Gene Spiegelman, Executive Vice President, New York said the ability for a retail brand to interact with a large, diverse and frequently changing consumer population has allowed Fifth Avenue rental values to exceed expectations.

"Global retail brands have become ever more sophisticated utilizing both traditional and social media marketing channels, however, these brands still recognize the immense value created via strategically placed 'brick and mortar' retailing, for which Fifth Avenue has been acknowledged as the leading global high street," he said.

Causeway Bay in Hong Kong remained in second place and Tokyo's Ginza in third place.

London's New Bond Street dropped two rankings, from fourth to sixth despite a rental increase of 4.3%.

The UK street falls behind Avenue des Champs-Elysées in Paris which is now the most expensive retail location in Europe having registered a rental uplift of 5.3%, compared with a decrease of 9.5% last year.

Cushman & Wakefield noted that despite the fragile economic recovery and subdued consumer sentiment in many countries, global retail markets have rebounded strongly during the last year.

Martin Mahmuti of the EMEA Research team said the growth in global retail markets is supported by aggressive retailer expansion in emerging markets and fierce competition for the best and most high-profile global shopping locations amongst successful brands.

"We do not foresee international activity slowing down; occupier demand is expected to remain robust as retailers seek to enter new prime markets abroad rather than looking for compromised locations in their own back yards," Mahmuti said.

Over four-fifths or 81% of the 63 countries surveyed by Cushman & Wakefield for its Main Streets Across the World report recorded prime rents increasing or remaining static over the year to June.

This represents a large increase on the previous year of 66%. Around one fifth of countries equivalent to 19% saw rents falling, compared with over one third (34%) in 2010.

The Cushman & Wakefield report provides a barometer of the global retail market, tracking rents in the top 278 shopping locations across 63 countries. It includes a ranking, produced using the most expensive location in each of the countries.

Cushman & Wakefield said the Asia-Pacific and Latin America regions led the global growth in retail rents.

Asia-Pacific saw a rental uplift of 12.2% with Wangfujing in Beijing recording the largest growth (109.5%) and is the biggest riser globally this year.

Rents in South Americarose overall by 10.6% and Garcia D'avilla street in Rio de Janeiro was the highest climber with a rental uplift of 52.2%.