Stripe has quietly bulked up its Seattle footprint at Madison Centre, the 36-story tower in downtown’s Central Business District. The payments giant first planted a local engineering hub in the building in 2018 and has steadily grown its presence there since. The latest move adds one more data point to a recent run of sizable downtown leases that brokers say is helping the once-wobbly office market find its footing.
Lease expansion lands this week
According to the Puget Sound Business Journal, Stripe expanded its lease at Madison Centre on July 9, 2026, joining a cluster of other large deals inked in the most recent leasing quarter. The outlet notes Stripe first moved into the tower in 2018 and frames the new agreement as part of an emerging uptick in activity downtown, where every fresh deal gets outsized attention from landlords and tenants alike.
How much space? A look at the numbers
Public market data show this is not Stripe’s first time adding room at the tower. Cushman & Wakefield reports a 22,774-square-foot expansion by Stripe at Madison Centre in its Q3 2025 MarketBeat. That earlier bump, bundled with other hefty tech leases, helped push transaction volumes higher even as overall vacancy stayed stubbornly elevated.
Who owns the tower and what is its story?
Madison Centre is owned by BXP, which completed its purchase of the property in May 2022 for roughly $730 million, according to a company release from BXP. The Class A high-rise opened in 2017 and totals roughly three-quarters of a million square feet, putting it firmly in the heavyweight category of modern downtown Seattle office buildings.
Reading the tea leaves on downtown leasing
Commercial real estate firms say a pattern is emerging: tech tenants are renewing or carefully expanding, not sprinting for the exits. Cushman & Wakefield pegged downtown vacancy at about 35.1% in Q3 2025, but also flagged a recent uptick in large leases. The picture is hardly rosy, yet brokers say the flight-to-quality trend is real, as companies cherry-pick newer, amenity-loaded buildings like Madison Centre while leaving older stock to fend for itself.
Permits point to staying power
Permits and local reporting show Stripe has been reshaping its space at Madison Centre over the past few years. The Real Deal reported in April 2025 that Stripe filed plans to renovate its offices, and public permit trackers list tenant-improvement filings at 920 5th Avenue tied to Stripe in 2025 (see BuildZoom). Those filings signal build-outs rather than speculative “just in case” leasing, which brokers often read as a sign that a tenant plans to stick around.
Stripe’s latest expansion is modest in the grand scheme of downtown Seattle’s vacancy problem, but it is still a meaningful vote of confidence in the city’s core. Market watchers will be keeping a close eye on new leases and renovation permits at Madison Centre for any hint that this could be the start of a broader comeback in the Central Business District, rather than just another one-off win.
