The floor area in a commercial property that is actually available for tenants to occupy and pay rent on. In a shopping center it is the number landlords, brokers, and parking studies use to describe size: a 120,000-square-foot neighborhood center means about 120,000 square feet that can be leased, not the entire building envelope including mechanical rooms and common corridors.
What Is In and What Is Out
Definitions vary slightly by lease form and by country, but the working idea is tenant space. Store interiors count. Many common areas (malls, public restrooms, service corridors) do not. Parking lots never do. That is why a parking ratio is written as stalls per 1,000 square feet of leasable area rather than per acre of asphalt. If you mix gross building area with leasable area, you will understate how much parking the tenants actually need.
- In: tenant demised premises, including selling floor and the stockroom the tenant controls.
- Often out: enclosed mall corridors, public restrooms, management offices, and service corridors the landlord keeps.
- Never in: parking fields, landscaping, and unbuildable setbacks.
Why Site Selection Uses It
Center-type definitions from the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC) are stated in GLA bands. Parking recommendations from the Urban Land Institute (ULI) are stalls per 1,000 square feet of GLA. Rent is almost always quoted that way (dollars per square foot of leasable area). A retailer comparing two sites should ask which number is on the flyer. A 40,000-square-foot “building” with 28,000 square feet of GLA is a different deal from 40,000 square feet of GLA.
Related Measures
| Measure | What It Usually Means | Use it for |
| Gross leasable area | Tenant-occupiable floor area | Rent, parking ratios, center classification |
| Gross building area | The whole enclosed structure | Construction cost, not tenant mix |
| Sales floor | The portion customers walk | Productivity (sales per square foot of selling area) |
If a flyer uses a narrower tenant-area figure, ask for it in words. Do not assume every “leasable” number was measured the same way.