Why Real Estate Developers Are Hiring for Retrofit and Refurbishment Expertise

For much of modern real estate, growth has been closely tied to building something new.

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That model remains essential: acquire a site, secure planning, deliver new stock and create value through development. New housing is still needed. So are new logistics facilities, data centres, infrastructure and commercial buildings. The argument here is not that development is abandoning new construction. On the contrary, the data suggests that an increasingly important part of value creation is happening in existing buildings.

Refurbishment, retrofit and repositioning have moved from the margins of development strategy towards the centre of it. In office markets – across the likes of London, New York, Frankfurt, and more – this is now difficult to dismiss as a temporary response to a difficult cycle.

Deloitte’s latest London Office Crane Survey found that refurbishment accounted for 66% of all new office starts by volume in 2025. New build starts fell to 1.6 million sq ft, less than half the 3.6 million sq ft recorded in 2024, while 3.1 million sq ft of refurbishment projects commenced. Refurbishment has now outstripped new development throughout the post-Covid period.

That does not mean every developer is suddenly becoming a retrofit specialist. Nor does it mean demolition and redevelopment have become obsolete. Every asset presents a different commercial, technical and planning equation. The shift is in the question owners and developers are asking before the ‘what’s next?’ decision.

Where previous cycles may have more readily led to a choice between holding an asset or redeveloping it, businesses are increasingly examining a broader set of possibilities. Can the building be upgraded? Can its performance be improved? Can it be repositioned for a different occupier? Can value be created without starting again?

Crucially, what combination of people and skill set is required to make those decisions and deliver them successfully?

The data suggests a shift in development activity

One of the clearest examples can be found in London’s office market.

Deloitte’s April 2026 research, covering activity during 2025 recorded approximately 4.8 million sq ft of new starts across 57 schemes. That was down from 7.5 million sq ft in 2024 and below the five year average of 6.5 million sq ft.

The survey also noted that refurbishment activity has exceeded new build activity throughout much of the post-pandemic period and has become a defining feature of the current development pipeline.

Higher construction costs, financing pressures and more challenging development viability have made the economics of ground up construction harder in many cases. A new build scheme may require a lengthy planning process, substantial upfront capital and a long delivery programme before income is generated.

The calculation is therefore becoming more nuanced than a simple choice between old and new.

In some circumstances, redevelopment will still provide the strongest return. In others, retaining the existing structure, upgrading its performance and repositioning it for a new market may prove more attractive. The growing prominence of refurbishment suggests that more businesses are at least willing to investigate the latter before committing to the former.

Occupier expectations continue to evolve

‘Flight to quality’ has become one of the most frequently used phrases in commercial real estate. Like many worn out market expressions, it risks becoming less meaningful through repetition. However, the underlying point remains important. Occupiers are becoming more careful about the buildings they choose. Location still matters, of course, and so do rents and lease terms. But building performance, sustainability credentials, workplace experience, energy use and long term operating costs have become ever more significant parts of the proposition. This creates a widening gap between buildings that can meet contemporary requirements and those that cannot.

Deloitte’s research has repeatedly linked refurbishment activity to occupier demand for premium, modern space and the need to prevent assets from becoming obsolete. Its earlier surveys described deep refurbishment as a route to delivering best-in-class office space while retaining existing structures, and the latest data shows that this approach remains central to the development pipeline.

For owners of older assets, that presents both a threat and an opportunity.

The threat is straightforward. A building that cannot meet occupier expectations may become progressively harder to let, finance or sell. The opportunity is that the same building may contain unrealised value if it can be intelligently repositioned.

That distinction is increasingly important for development and asset management teams. Two buildings in comparable locations can produce very different outcomes depending on their technical performance, flexibility and ability to meet the requirements of the occupier market.

Refurbishment is about deciding which interventions are commercially worth making and which will materially improve the competitiveness of the asset, not simply about making an old building look new. That brings development, asset management, leasing, sustainability and technical expertise into much closer contact.

This helps to explain why retrofit and refurbishment is being discussed as a business issue rather than solely an environmental one.

Retrofit has moved beyond sustainability

The environmental case for improving existing buildings is well established, but the commercial conversation has come to the forefront.

According to the UK Green Building Council, commercial buildings currently account for 23% of built environment carbon emissions in the UK. UKGBC also points to evidence that assets with stronger sustainability credentials are increasingly attracting higher rents and capital values.

For an asset owner, therefore, sustainability is increasingly intertwined with questions of competitiveness and value. Will the building remain attractive to tenants? What will it cost to operate? What capital expenditure will be required over the next decade? How exposed is the asset to changing energy standards? At what point does the cost of inaction become greater than the cost of intervention?

These are not questions for a sustainability team to answer in isolation. They affect investment decisions, leasing strategies, development appraisals and long term portfolio planning. They also explain why building performance is becoming a more prominent part of the commercial conversation. The familiar statistic that approximately 80% of the UK’s 2050 building stock already exists provides useful context here. If most of the buildings expected to be in use in 2050 are already standing today, then improving existing stock is a practical necessity.

New development will remain critical. The future built environment cannot be delivered through retrofit alone, but neither can the performance of that future built environment be improved solely through what gets constructed next. A significant proportion of the challenge (and the opportunity) lies in the buildings already on investors’ balance sheets.

Policy and regulation are reinforcing the trend

Market demand is one part of the equation. Policy and regulation are also encouraging owners to take a longer term view of building performance. The trajectory of Minimum Energy Efficiency Standards, alongside broader net zero commitments and evolving expectations around energy performance, has made obsolescence a more prominent risk in investment and development decisions.

Deloitte has repeatedly identified tightening energy standards as one of the factors driving refurbishment activity, alongside demand for premium space.

The government’s Retrofit for the Future guide is more narrowly focused on residential retrofit, rather than commercial property, but it is still instructive in one respect. Effective retrofit requires coordinated thinking across multiple stages and disciplines, from planning and building fabric to services, site delivery and stakeholder engagement.

The principle applies more widely; for commercial owners, the question is whether the building is likely to remain compliant, lettable and competitive as requirements change.

That creates a more strategic approach to capital expenditure. Rather than waiting for a building to become obviously obsolete, owners are increasingly having to consider when intervention should happen, what form it should take and how it fits within the wider investment strategy.

What does this mean for hiring

From a recruitment perspective, the most interesting consequence is not the creation of entirely new job titles. The roles required to deliver refurbishment and repositioning, in many cases, already exists within the industry. Building Surveyors, Project Managers, Development Managers, Asset Managers, Sustainability Consultants and technical specialists have long been essential to the built environment. The change appears in the way their expertise is combined.

A ground up development and a complex refurbishment project can require very different skillsets. Existing assets may demand deeper technical due diligence, a clearer understanding of building performance, more detailed stakeholder management and a greater ability to work around constraints that cannot simply be designed away.

A refurbishment programme may involve existing occupiers, local authorities, planners, investors, contractors, engineers and specialist advisers – often simultaneously. That makes technical competence necessary, but it’s not sufficient.

Employers are looking for professionals who can understand how technical, commercial and environmental considerations interact across the lifecycle of an asset. In hiring terms, the premium may therefore be moving towards people who can connect disciplines rather than operate entirely within one.

We see this in the types of capability employers need to assess:

• sustainability and ESG implementation;
• building performance analysis;
• energy efficiency programmes;
• capital planning;
• asset repositioning;
• technical due diligence;
• retrofit project delivery; and
• stakeholder management across complex projects.

Every professional does not need to be an expert in all of these areas.

However, the teams need access to them, and leaders need to understand where:

1. Those capabilities sit within their organisation;
2. The gaps are; and
3. Whether the existing structure can deliver the strategy being developed.

This is where hiring becomes more than just an administrative task. A business can have a great asset strategy on paper and still struggle to execute it if the talent required to deliver it are missing, overloaded or operating in disconnected functions.

Innovation is expanding the range of retrofit options

Technology is adding another layer to the challenge. Every existing building presents its own constraints, whether its age, structure, services, occupancy and location. However, the range of available interventions is expanding.

UKGBC’s Commercial Retrofit Innovation Map identifies more than 530 solutions across 162 intervention points, covering areas including design and planning, operational energy and resource reduction, energy generation and storage, and low carbon materials. Innovation and technology haven’t necessarily made retrofit projects more straightforward. If anything, a broader range of options can make the process more complex. Owners and project teams must still determine which solutions are technically viable, commercially sensible and appropriate for the specific asset.

This has implications for talent. As retrofit programmes become more technically sophisticated, businesses may need professionals who can evaluate new technologies, interpret building performance data, assess energy saving measures and integrate those decisions into a wider development or asset management strategy.

What does the data tell us about the market

Market activity provides one indicator of where the industry is heading, and hiring activity often provides another. That is one of the reasons recruitment can provide a useful perspective on market change.

By the time a trend becomes obvious in a completed building or an investment announcement, the organisational decisions required to support it may already have begun. Businesses may have changed the profile of the people they are hiring, redefined leadership roles, added technical expertise or started looking for professionals who can bridge previously separate functions.

Our expertise lies in seeing how organisations respond to those strategies through people:

• where demand is building
• which skills are becoming harder to secure
• how employers are reshaping teams around changing market conditions

Whether the discussion centres on sustainability, asset management, development, project delivery or building performance, recruitment trends often highlight where organisations are building capability and where skills shortages may emerge.

For employers, these insights can support workforce planning decisions. For professionals, they offer a clearer understanding of the skills and disciplines attracting the most demand across the market.

Final thoughts

The growth in refurbishment does not signal the end of new development. That would be both commercially and practically implausible. New homes, infrastructure, logistics facilities and commercial space will remain essential.

What the data does suggest is that existing buildings are playing a larger role in how real estate businesses think about growth and value creation. For owners and investors, that means making more complex decisions about which assets to retain, improve, reposition or redevelop. For employers, it means ensuring they have the right talent to execute those strategies.

The advantage will not necessarily lie with the largest teams, but with those that understand which expertise is critical, how different disciplines need to work together and where gaps need to be addressed before they affect delivery.

Refurbishment and retrofit are not new. What is changing is their scale, commercial significance and influence on investment decisions. The next phase of real estate development may therefore be shaped not only by what gets built, but by what can be made better, making decisions about workforce planning inseparable from decisions about the assets themselves.