Vacancies down and rents up in Boston

After several years of upward movement, second-quarter activity in Boston's office market was "almost at the peak achieved in 2000," according to a new report from Jones Lang LaSalle, a Chicago real estate money management and services firm with a big presence in Boston. Rents and vacancy rates are nearing levels that "invite new construction for the first time in three years," noted William P. Barrack, the Jones Lang LaSalle managing director who authored the report on the Boston office market.