Chapter 4
AI Adoption & Real Estate Impacts
New Zealand Office Occupier Sentiment Survey 2026
AI is everywhere. But what happens next?
Nearly every organisation surveyed is now using AI in some form. Yet despite widespread adoption, most occupiers remain in the early stages of implementation, with relatively few having embedded AI into core business workflows.Drawing on responses from 67 New Zealand occupiers, this section explores how organisations are adopting AI today, where they expect it to impact their workforce, and whether it will ultimately reshape workplace and real estate decisions.
From experimentation to implementation
AI is now in use almost everywhere, but embedded in few workflows
AI adoption is now near-universal, with 98% of survey respondents reporting some form of AI use. This survey result is consistent with data from AI service providers; usage analytics by Anthropic show New Zealand as the 13th highest Claude adopter amongst 113 countries.The distribution of maturity however is uneven. The most common state is AI applied to specific functions or processes, followed by ad-hoc use and trialing in specific cases. Only 13% of our survey respondents have embedded it into core workflows.
Understandably, Technology occupiers are the adoption leaders: 75% report AI as either used broadly or embedded in core workflows. Government and legal sectors show the lowest depth of adoption, consistent with tighter procurement and information-governance regimes. The overall picture is a market in the midst of its AI adoption curve, with most organisations having moved past experimentation but not yet at the point of deeper integration.
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Kirstin Cooper
Associate Director, Workplace Consulting, New Zealand
Campbell Pritchard
National Director, Leasing - Office, New Zealand
