Four out of five commercial real estate (CRE), workplace, building management, and facilities professionals lack the data they need to make confident space-planning decisions, according to a new report.
The survey, conducted by Wakefield Research, interviewed 400 decision-makers in the U.S. for Butlr’s “Beyond Occupancy: The State of Office Space 2026” report. The results show how the workplace data insight gap is disrupting CRE strategy, driving up facilities costs, and undermining workforce productivity and retention.
According to the report, key findings include:
- 62% of decision-makers don’t know how office space is used without directly asking or using privacy-compromising technology to observe employees.
- Only 19% make space-planning decisions based on data while more than a third, 36%, rely on gut instinct.
- 24% of unoccupied office space is regularly heated and cooled.
- 52% have delayed or canceled office expansion plans due to uncertainty about how the space is used.
- 76% are concerned their current office layout is not delivering the most productive use of space.
“The evidence is clear that critical, multimillion-dollar real estate decisions can no longer be left to gut instinct or a patchwork of disconnected proptech tools,” said Honghao Deng, CEO and co-founder of Butlr. “The survey results also show the positive actions decision-makers are taking to improve the office from a technology and cultural perspective, including the day-to-day experience of everyone in the building. Once they fill the spatial intelligence data gap, they can make tremendous strides in transforming the built environment to be more responsive to the needs of the people in it.”
Workforce Productivity and Retention
Despite growing demand for spatial occupancy data to inform workplace strategies, the report found that most decision-makers are unclear about how their offices are being used for focused work and team collaboration. However, nearly all (99%) believe more efficient workspaces will improve the employee experience in a variety of ways, including:
- Increased productivity: 59%
- Improved employee focus: 52%
- Greater collaboration: 47%
- Employee retention: 78%
- Greater cleanliness: 47%
Renovations and Construction
For nearly all decision-makers (99%), uncertainty about how office space is used has caused upheaval in renovation- and construction-related business plans over the past five years. The disruptions span nearly every type of major decision:
- 48% delayed or canceled renovations or reconstruction.
- 44% put consolidation plans on hold.
- 47% postponed or canceled investments aimed at improving energy management.
Cleaning and Energy Costs
Decision-makers estimate that in a typical week, 24% of unused or underused space continues to be heated and cooled. Yet a majority of survey participants (62%) believe energy costs are the top area where better utilization insights could deliver measurable savings.
Cleaning costs are another largely unaddressed opportunity, as 60% believe this is an area where better data could yield measurable savings. A full 82% of decision-makers say cleaning schedules are not based on occupancy data for individual spaces, and 66% clean all areas with the same frequency regardless of actual use.
Lack of Data Insight
Currently, nearly all survey participants use proptech or building management tools or methods to better understand how office space is used. The top three most common approaches are desk or room reservation systems (55%), employee surveys (54%), and/or sensor-based occupancy data (53%). Despite the breadth of technology investments, 79% still find that data challenges hinder their ability to make layout changes.
Further, privacy looms large as a barrier, with 92% of decision-makers citing it as an obstacle to obtaining space utilization data. This challenge is more acute at larger organizations where 69% of decision-makers at companies with more than 1,000 employees view privacy as a moderate to major barrier, compared to 52% at smaller companies.
According to the study, a logical path to getting space utilization data is maximizing existing technology solutions. Yet participants report challenges including finding a system that can scale as needs grow (55%), followed by difficulty integrating with existing systems (48%). Nearly all (90%) cite concerns about the time required to install and begin collecting usable data.
The full report is available here.