After taking a hit during the recession, the suburban office market’s comeback is well underway — and businesses of all sizes are starting to take notice.

Although there’s no shortage of available space in the suburbs — the national vacancy rate for suburban office properties was 15.1 percent in the second quarter of 2015, versus 10.6 percent for buildings downtown, according to CBRE — demand is on the rise. A total of 13.3 million square feet of suburban space was absorbed last quarter, more than double the quarterly average of 6 million square feet since 2010, allowing office landlords to push rents as vacancy continues to fall.

This renewed interest in the suburbs, which have seen little new construction since the recession, is prompting some landlords to overhaul existing properties to make them more attractive to businesses considering a move.

In the case of larger office parks, many of which have started showing their age, this sometimes means adding restaurants, hotels and even a residential component to transform them into live-work-play communities designed to replicate the downtown experience.

In order to make an informed decision about which is better – city or suburbs – businesses should weigh several factors before committing to a lease. Amata CEO Ron Bockstahler provides an overview in this contributed byline for BizJournals.com.