Virginia · Northern Virginia
Northern Virginia Feasibility Studies
Five Virginia jurisdictions and nothing wider: Fairfax, Arlington, Loudoun and Prince William counties and the city of Alexandria, with the multi-state Washington metro and the District of Columbia at its center left outside this page. Feasibility Study Company prepares feasibility studies in Northern Virginia for owners and developers, and for the SBA, USDA and bank lenders who finance them. Inside those lines the year to March 2026 divided the payroll: Fairfax County's covered establishments held 622,779 jobs and Arlington County's 171,969, each fewer than a year before, while Loudoun County's 206,071 had grown 1.
Fairfax, Arlington and Alexandria shed covered jobs over the twelve months to March 2026; Loudoun and Prince William gained.
Feasibility Study Company writes independent, lender-grade feasibility studies on projects in Fairfax, Arlington, Loudoun and Prince William counties and the city of Alexandria, for borrowers using USDA Rural Development, SBA 7(a) or 504, EB-5 or conventional loans. The first question a Northern Virginia feasibility study has to settle here is which of the five payrolls stands behind the subject, because in the year to March 2026 they did not move together.
For March 2026, the Virginia county employment and wages release from BLS counts 622,779 jobs in Fairfax County's covered establishments, 171,969 in Arlington County and 79,023 in the city of Alexandria, and in each of the three the count stood below March 2025 1. Loudoun County's 206,071 and Prince William County's 146,398 were both above their year-earlier levels 1. The Virginia state page carries the statewide federal workforce record that sits behind that year, and this page keeps to the five jurisdiction counts.
Pay sorts the five differently from headcount. Average weekly wages for the first quarter were $2,901 in Arlington County, $2,451 in Fairfax County, $1,944 in Alexandria and $1,292 in Prince William County, and the release shows each of them higher than a year before (it prints Loudoun's figure too) 1. These are wages paid by establishments located in each jurisdiction, so they describe the jobs, not the people who live nearby. An Arlington office tower's payroll is drawn from commuters across the region. A restaurant, childcare center or fitness club sells to residents, and for that side of the ledger a study turns to household income by place of residence, which the table below gives.
The resident labor count comes from a wider frame. The BLS Northern Virginia table puts employed residents at 1,647,917 in September 2026, a preliminary figure, not seasonally adjusted, for a region that also takes in Fauquier, Stafford and Spotsylvania counties and the city of Fredericksburg 8. That total cannot be laid against the five-jurisdiction job counts above as though the two shared a boundary. At the county level, FFXnow reported 23,749 jobless residents in Fairfax County for January 2026, preliminary, more than the county had in January 2025 9. A consumer project in Fairfax County should carry that softer start to 2026 in its ramp, not only the wage level.
| Jurisdiction | Covered employment, March 2026 | Change since March 2025 | Weekly wage, average, Q1 2026 | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fairfax County | 622,779 | Lower | $2,451 | 1 |
| Arlington County | 171,969 | Lower | $2,901 | 1 |
| Alexandria city | 79,023 | Lower | $1,944 | 1 |
| Loudoun County | 206,071 | Higher | Printed in the release | 1 |
| Prince William County | 146,398 | Higher | $1,292 | 1 |
Household income and owner-occupied home value come from the American Community Survey five-year estimates for 2020 to 2024, read jurisdiction by jurisdiction from the Census Bureau's own county and city tables; nothing in the table is a regional average.
| Jurisdiction | Median household income | Median value, owner-occupied units | Period | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fairfax County | $153,637 | $732,800 | 2020 to 2024, five-year | 10 |
| Arlington County | $142,114 | $895,000 | 2020 to 2024, five-year | 10 |
| Loudoun County | $181,765 | $743,800 | 2020 to 2024, five-year | 10 |
| Prince William County | $131,402 | $530,100 | 2020 to 2024, five-year | 10 |
| Alexandria city | $119,681 | $735,100 | 2020 to 2024, five-year | 10 |
Where new households are landing: permits in three jurisdictions, asking prices in all five.
The research behind this page did not retrieve the Census Bureau's Vintage 2025 population for any of the five jurisdictions: the county table sits on a Census host the research could not use, and the Weldon Cooper Center's locality estimates were not opened. A study that needs a resident count, as almost every consumer-facing one does, takes it from either source directly and names the vintage. This page offers no substitute figure and does not estimate one.
New construction is the dated signal it does hold. Census permit series relayed by the St. Louis Fed record 2,862 new private housing structures authorized in Fairfax County in 2025, 1,340 in Prince William County and 1,309 in Arlington County 11712. The series is titled in structures while its unit label reads units, so a study that counts apartments should confirm against the Census Bureau's own permit files which of the two it is reading. Alexandria's series printed an implausibly small 2025 value and is not used, and Loudoun's is not shown here; for both, the study goes to the Census files directly.
Asking prices show where the household money sits. Realtor.com's median listing price for September 2026 was $782,450 in Loudoun County, $724,900 in Fairfax County, $619,648 in Arlington County, $599,995 in Prince William County and $534,950 in the city of Alexandria 61314515. A listing median is what sellers asked for the homes on the market that month; the survey values in the table above are what owners said their homes were worth across five years. The two answer different questions, and a study keeps them apart rather than reading a growth rate from one to the other.
For a project that depends on new rooftops, the useful reading is the neighborhood, not the county. Prince William's 1,340 permitted structures 7 and its $599,995 listing median 5 describe the county a new rooftop project there sells into, and a for-sale, build-to-rent or neighborhood retail study there has to count the approved lots and recorded plats within the subject's drive time, not the county total. Counting at that scale is the subject of the research note the trade area is the study.
Dulles set two passenger records in 2025; Reagan National carried fewer travelers than in 2024.
Two airports anchor the region's visitor and business-travel demand, and both sit inside this page's five jurisdictions. Washington Dulles International, which lies in Loudoun and Fairfax counties, carried 29.01 million passengers in 2025, a record, and 10.53 million of them were international travelers, another record 2. Ronald Reagan Washington National in Arlington County carried 24.89 million, fewer than in 2024 2. The airports authority puts the two together at more than 53.9 million 2.
The two airports sit in different hotel and service markets. Around Dulles, on the Route 28 and Dulles Toll Road corridor, an international count of that size is a segment a hotel study can name and test. Around Reagan National, in Crystal City, Pentagon City and Old Town Alexandria, the airport sits beside the same office districts whose payrolls the county release shows shrinking, so the study tests weekday business demand against those counts. A record at one airport and a decline at the other is a reason to read the subject's own corridor, not the regional total.
For a hotel study, the passenger counts explain demand segments; they do not size a property's share. The subject's competitive set, its trailing twelve months of occupancy and rate, and the rooms opening nearby do that work, and our note on reading the STR report shows how the competitive set is drawn.
Road access is the gap. The research found no Virginia Department of Transportation traffic counts for the I-66, I-95, Route 1, Route 7, Route 28 or Dulles corridors, so this page prints none. A fuel, quick-service or car wash project on any of those roads needs the VDOT count for the segment that passes the site, its year, and a statement of how far the counting station sits from the driveway.
Office and industrial read from two broker ledgers; data centers have no dated count.
Office and industrial supply here is published by brokers, and the two used on this page, CBRE and Cushman & Wakefield, each draw their own Northern Virginia boundary. Neither boundary is the five jurisdictions of this page, and they are not the same as each other. This page states each broker's number in its own sentence, never averaged, ranked or set against the other.
Office: CBRE's reading
CBRE reports net absorption of +355,000 square feet for the third quarter of 2026 and positive absorption of 941,000 square feet across the first three quarters of the year 4. Its overall average asking rent was $37.80 per square foot, and the page does not say whether that rent is quoted full service or on another basis 4. A study that uses the CBRE rent has to establish the basis before it compares the figure with a lease the subject has signed.
Office: Cushman & Wakefield's reading
Cushman & Wakefield puts the average full-service asking rent at $36.45 per square foot for Q3 2026 and breaks it out by jurisdiction: $40.63 in Arlington County, $36.76 in the city of Alexandria, $35.44 in Fairfax County and $28.87 in Loudoun County 3. It records net absorption of +413,800 square feet for the quarter and +377,800 in Alexandria, a city figure it attributes to the National Science Foundation occupying space at 401 Dulany Street 3. Prince William County carries no rent or absorption figure in either broker's report.
That single move is the lesson for a lender. One federal tenant can drive a jurisdiction's quarter, and the next quarter can return space as quickly. An office acquisition, an office-to-residential conversion or a ground-floor retail plan in Alexandria or Arlington should rest on leasing by tenants other than the one large occupier, on effective rents rather than asking rents (the gap is explained in a research note, effective rent vs. asking rent), and on an absorption record traced tenant by tenant, the method in our absorption forensics note. Where conversion is on the table, the office repurposing note covers what a lender tests.
Industrial: CBRE's reading
CBRE's industrial report gives an average asking rent of $18.10 per square foot for Q3 2026 and 283,000 square feet completed in the quarter, of which about 61% was still available 16. The same report lists one project under construction without printing its size 16, so a study cannot read the pipeline from it and has to confirm what is being built near the subject from permits.
Industrial: Cushman & Wakefield's reading
Cushman & Wakefield prints an overall industrial asking rent of $18.73 per square foot for Q3 2026 and net absorption of +168,600 square feet in the quarter 17. A flex, contractor-yard or last-mile project quotes that rent only with the broker's name and definition beside it.
Data centers: the dated count is missing
Loudoun County publishes counts of data center buildings, floor area, permits, tax revenue and jobs, but on a page that carries no publication date, and an undated page cannot date a figure. This page therefore prints none of them. The covered employment counts above are the dated evidence of Loudoun's growth. A project whose demand rests on data center construction, such as crew housing, a contractor services yard or a limited-service hotel on Route 28, takes its pipeline from dated county documents, an adopted budget or issued building permits, and cites them by date. The statewide data center tax picture is on the Virginia page.
Apartments, retail and hotels
The research found no current broker figures for Northern Virginia multifamily, retail or hotel supply: one broker's multifamily page and another's retail page returned no metrics. For those classes the study builds its own competitive inventory, property by property, with each competitor's rent or rate and opening date, and says where that inventory came from.
| Class | Broker and measure | Figure | Period | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Office | CBRE, net absorption | +355,000 sq. ft. | Q3 2026 | 4 |
| Office | CBRE, positive absorption, year to date | 941,000 sq. ft. | Q1 to Q3 2026 | 4 |
| Office | CBRE, overall average asking rent (basis not stated) | $37.80 per sq. ft. | Q3 2026 | 4 |
| Office | Cushman & Wakefield, average full-service asking rent | $36.45 per sf | Q3 2026 | 3 |
| Office | Cushman & Wakefield, full-service asking rent, Arlington County | $40.63 per sf | Q3 2026 | 3 |
| Office | Cushman & Wakefield, full-service asking rent, Alexandria city | $36.76 per sf | Q3 2026 | 3 |
| Office | Cushman & Wakefield, full-service asking rent, Fairfax County | $35.44 per sf | Q3 2026 | 3 |
| Office | Cushman & Wakefield, full-service asking rent, Loudoun County | $28.87 per sf | Q3 2026 | 3 |
| Office | Cushman & Wakefield, net absorption | +413,800 sf | Q3 2026 | 3 |
| Office | Cushman & Wakefield, net absorption, Alexandria city (driven by one occupier) | +377,800 sf | Q3 2026 | 3 |
| Industrial | CBRE, average asking rent | $18.10 per sq. ft. | Q3 2026 | 16 |
| Industrial | CBRE, space completed in the quarter | 283,000 sq. ft. | Q3 2026 | 16 |
| Industrial | Cushman & Wakefield, overall asking rent | $18.73 psf | Q3 2026 | 17 |
| Industrial | Cushman & Wakefield, net absorption | +168,600 sf | Q3 2026 | 17 |
| Data centers, apartments, retail, hotels | Dated supply counts | None in the research | Gap | Gap |
To start a study, send three things: what is to be built, bought or refinanced; which of the five jurisdictions holds the site, or the submarket if the parcel is not fixed yet; and where the money is coming from, whether an SBA lender, USDA, EB-5 investors or a bank's own balance sheet. The reply sets out the framework the study will follow and the deliverable the program expects.
Independent cities inside and beside the counties change which code governs a parcel.
Each of the five jurisdictions writes its own zoning, permits its own buildings and taxes its own property. Alexandria is an independent city, governed apart from any county. Fairfax County also surrounds or borders independent cities that this page does not cover, the City of Fairfax and Falls Church among them, and Prince William County has Manassas and Manassas Park inside its outline. A parcel with a Fairfax or Manassas mailing address can sit in a city with different rules from the county around it, which is why a Northern Virginia feasibility study consultant confirms the governing jurisdiction from the parcel record before reading a single figure for it.
The research gathered for this page holds none of those rulebooks. It found no zoning or short-term rental ordinance for any of the five, and no building permit or certificate of occupancy report from any of them. Each of those is a stated gap: the study obtains the current zoning district and permitted uses from the jurisdiction's own code, the short-term rental rule from its ordinance where a lodging or furnished-rental project depends on it, and the permit and occupancy record from the jurisdiction's permit office, each with the date it was read.
Those rules decide feasibility more often than the market does in a built-up place. On a small infill parcel in Arlington or Alexandria, the zoning district sets the floor area and parking the pro forma can count; on a Loudoun or Prince William greenfield site, the approval path and the timing of road and utility work set when revenue can begin. The site budget and schedule in the study come from those documents, not from an allowance.
SBA, USDA, EB-5 and bank capital, each read against its own rule.
No lender ranking, SBA district total or certified development company production record for these five jurisdictions turned up in the research. A sponsor choosing between lenders asks each one for its own recent production in the subject's asset class, and a 504 sponsor asks the development company for the same.
The program rules are fixed and dated. SBA's loan conditions say: 13 CFR 120.160(b): SBA may require professional appraisals, a survey, or a feasibility study 18. Coverage on a 7(a) loan has a standard floor of 1.15x, set in SOP 50 10 8.1 19. Whether a lender asks for a study on a given loan is the lender's call, and what that study must show for each program is laid out under our SBA lending work.
Conventional and institutional lenders on office, industrial and hotel loans here will want the broker discipline described above, one named report per statement, and a downside case tied to the jurisdiction's own payroll; the conventional and institutional practice page covers that work. An EB-5 project has to document its job creation and, where it claims a targeted employment area, the designation for the specific site; the EB-5 practice page explains both. Someone hiring a Northern Virginia feasibility study company needs the study written to the program the capital comes from, and the parcel decides which programs are open.
Rural, Opportunity Zone and HUBZone status is a parcel test, and the research holds none.
The research for this page holds no USDA rural eligibility reading, no Opportunity Zone tract list and no HUBZone designation for any part of the five jurisdictions, so the page asserts none. A sponsor considering a USDA Business and Industry guarantee checks the exact address against USDA's eligibility map before the application is planned; the steps after a site qualifies sit with our USDA Rural Development work. Opportunity Zone and HUBZone status are confirmed the same way, tract by tract, with the date of the map read.
A sponsor whose search runs beyond these five jurisdictions will find other Virginia markets as sections of the state page: Richmond, Hampton Roads and Charlottesville each carry their own dated figures there.
The case library has nothing yet from Fairfax, Arlington, Loudoun, Prince William or Alexandria.
The case library has no project in Fairfax, Arlington, Loudoun, Prince William or Alexandria. The cases it does hold show how a study carries a program's rules through a pro forma: equity sized to the program tier, debt service coverage tested in the year the rule names, and a sensitivity table on the input the deal depends on most. A Northern Virginia hotel, office conversion or flex project would follow the same structure, with the inputs taken from the jurisdiction-level figures on this page. The full set is on the case studies page.
Eight checks for the credit file, from the parcel record to the road count.
The governing jurisdiction
The parcel record showing whether the site is in one of the five or in an independent city such as Fairfax, Falls Church, Manassas or Manassas Park, and which zoning code applies.
The payroll behind demand
Which jurisdiction's covered employment feeds the subject, the direction it moved over the year, and a downside case built from that count rather than a regional total.
One broker per statement
The office or industrial report whose market definition contains the site, named in every place its figures appear, with the rent basis stated.
Absorption traced to tenants
For an office or conversion project, leasing by occupiers other than a single government move, and effective rather than asking rent.
A dated population
A Census or Weldon Cooper resident count for the subject's jurisdiction with its vintage, since this page carries none.
Dated data center evidence
Where demand leans on data center construction or operations, county budget or permit documents with dates, not the undated county web page.
The road count
A VDOT traffic count for the segment that passes the site, with its year and the station's distance from the driveway.
Program status of the parcel
USDA rural, Opportunity Zone, HUBZone or EB-5 targeted employment area status read for the exact address, with the date of the map or letter.
Before a study in Fairfax, Arlington, Loudoun, Prince William or Alexandria is commissioned.
Which financing programs is a feasibility study in Northern Virginia written for, and what starts one?
SBA 7(a), SBA 504, USDA Rural Development, EB-5 and conventional bank loans, each with its own test, which the practice pages set out. What starts one is a message that says what the project is, which of the five jurisdictions holds the parcel (or the submarket, if the parcel is still open), and whether the capital is an SBA lender's, USDA's, EB-5 investors' or a bank's. The answer is the analytical framework the study will follow, the deliverable the program expects and the next steps, and the study then narrows from counts like Loudoun County's 206,071 covered jobs in March 2026 1 to the subject's own trade area.
Does a feasibility study for a Tysons office site and one for an Ashburn site read the same payroll?
No. The March 2026 county release puts Fairfax County's covered employment at 622,779 and Arlington County's at 171,969, both below March 2025, while Loudoun County's 206,071 and Prince William County's 146,398 stood above it 1. A project sold to Tysons or Rosslyn office workers is tested on a count that fell; one serving Loudoun's or Prince William's employers on a count that rose. The study states which jurisdiction's count applies and builds the downside case from that count rather than from a regional total such as the 1,647,917 employed residents BLS gives for a wider Northern Virginia region in September 2026 8.
How does a market study for an Arlington or Alexandria office project handle two brokers' Q3 2026 figures?
One broker per statement, named, and never a blend. Cushman & Wakefield prints full-service asking rents by jurisdiction for Q3 2026, $40.63 per square foot in Arlington County and $36.76 in the city of Alexandria against an average of $36.45, and net absorption of +377,800 square feet in Alexandria that it attributes to the National Science Foundation taking space on Dulany Street 3. CBRE prints an overall average asking rent of $37.80 and net absorption of +355,000 square feet for its own Northern Virginia boundary, without stating the rent basis 4. The study quotes the report whose boundary holds the site, reads effective rather than asking rent, and treats a quarter made by one federal occupier as that occupier's quarter.
What do the Dulles and Reagan National counts give a hotel feasibility study in Loudoun or Arlington?
Two airports moving in opposite directions, and two hotel markets. Dulles, in Loudoun and Fairfax counties, had 29.01 million passengers in 2025 and 10.53 million of them international, both records; Reagan National, in Arlington County, had 24.89 million, fewer than in 2024; the authority counts the pair at more than 53.9 million 2. A Route 28 or Dulles Toll Road hotel can name the international segment and test it; a Crystal City or Old Town hotel sits beside the office districts whose payrolls shrank over the year to March 2026 1 and is tested on weekday business demand. Neither total sizes a property's share: that comes from the subject's competitive set, its trailing occupancy and rate, and the rooms opening near it.
Can a feasibility study for a Loudoun County site use the county's own data center counts?
Not as this page reads them. Loudoun County's data center page lists its buildings, their floor area, permits, tax revenue and jobs without a publication date, and citing an undated figure does not date it, so none of those counts appears here. The dated evidence of the county's growth is its payroll, 206,071 jobs in covered establishments in March 2026, above the year before 1, and its listing median of $782,450 in September 2026 6. A crew housing, contractor yard or limited-service hotel project that leans on data center construction takes its pipeline from an adopted county budget or issued building permits, each cited by date, and the statewide tax position of the data centers themselves is on the Virginia page.
Where does an SBA feasibility study of a build-to-rent or retail project in Prince William County start from?
The county's own household and rooftop record, read at the neighborhood. Prince William County authorized 1,340 private housing structures in 2025 7; Realtor.com's median listing price there was $599,995 in September 2026, against $782,450 in Loudoun County next door 56; and the county's covered establishments held 146,398 jobs in March 2026 at an average weekly wage of $1,292, both higher than a year earlier 1. Neither broker prints a rent or absorption figure for Prince William, so the study counts the approved lots and recorded plats inside the subject's drive time and surveys the shopping centers it would compete with, and an SBA lender reads that count rather than the county total.
What does a market study for a flex or last-mile industrial project in Northern Virginia quote?
Each broker's Q3 2026 reading under that broker's name. CBRE's average asking rent is $18.10 per square foot, with 283,000 square feet completed in the quarter and about 61% of it still available, and it lists one project under construction without a size 16. Cushman & Wakefield gives an overall asking rent of $18.73 per square foot and net absorption of +168,600 square feet 17. Because neither report sizes the pipeline near a given parcel, the study confirms what is being built around the subject from permits and quotes a rent only with the broker's definition beside it.
Three of these five payrolls fell in the year to March 2026 and two rose.
A study for a site here starts from the one jurisdiction's count and wage, the broker report whose boundary holds the parcel and the airport or road its demand depends on, each with its date. The first message names the project, the jurisdiction or submarket and the capital source, and the reply is the framework the study follows, the deliverable the program calls for and what comes next.
Request a methodology briefingData sources and dates.
Each figure below carries a named publisher and a date. Where CBRE and Cushman & Wakefield both report a measure, the page keeps each broker's number in its own statement, under that broker's own market definition.
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, County Employment and Wages in Virginia, First Quarter 2026, September 2, 2026 (employment for March 2026; wages for the first quarter of 2026).
- Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, Washington's Airports Served Record 54 Million Passengers in 2025, February 24, 2026 (calendar 2025).
- Cushman & Wakefield, Northern Virginia Office MarketBeat, Q3 2026, October 8, 2026 (Q3 2026).
- CBRE, Northern Virginia Office Figures Q3 2026, September 30, 2026 (Q3 2026).
- Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (FRED), Housing Inventory: Median Listing Price in Prince William County, VA, October 1, 2026 (September 2026; Realtor.com original).
- Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (FRED), Housing Inventory: Median Listing Price in Loudoun County, VA, October 1, 2026 (September 2026; Realtor.com original).
- Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (FRED), New Private Housing Structures Authorized by Building Permits for Prince William County, VA, May 28, 2026 (2025 annual; U.S. Census Bureau original).
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Northern Virginia, VA: Labor force data (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Mid-Atlantic Information Office), October 2026 table (September 2026, preliminary).
- FFXnow, Fairfax County started 2026 with more jobless residents than it did 2025, latest data shows, April 20, 2026 (January 2026, preliminary; state labor data released April 16, 2026).
- U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey, American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates, Detailed Tables, 2020-2024 (Census Data API acs/acs5), 2020 to 2024 five-year estimates; retrieved October 16, 2026.
- Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (FRED), New Private Housing Structures Authorized by Building Permits for Fairfax County, VA, May 28, 2026 (2025 annual; U.S. Census Bureau original).
- Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (FRED), New Private Housing Structures Authorized by Building Permits for Arlington County, VA, May 28, 2026 (2025 annual; U.S. Census Bureau original).
- Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (FRED), Housing Inventory: Median Listing Price in Fairfax County, VA, October 1, 2026 (September 2026; Realtor.com original).
- Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (FRED), Housing Inventory: Median Listing Price in Arlington County, VA, October 1, 2026 (September 2026; Realtor.com original).
- Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (FRED), Housing Inventory: Median Listing Price in Alexandria City, VA, October 1, 2026 (September 2026; Realtor.com original).
- CBRE, Northern Virginia Industrial Figures Q3 2026, September 30, 2026 (Q3 2026).
- Cushman & Wakefield, Northern Virginia Industrial MarketBeat, October 7, 2026 (Q3 2026).
- eCFR, 13 CFR 120.160, Loan conditions, current to October 7, 2026.
- U.S. Small Business Administration, SOP 50 10 8.1, Lender and Development Company Loan Programs, with Technical Policy Updates, effective October 1, 2026.