Offices

Planetizen - A new analysis from the Urban Institute takes a look at which cities will get the biggest bang for their buck out of office to residential conversions. According to UI Research Associate Jorge González-Hermoso, facing unprecedented commercial vacancy rates and a national shortage of approximately four million homes, local governments across the country are incentivizing adaptive reuse of vacant offices into housing. “One estimate points to 58,000 new housing units currently being built in the US from repurposed office space,” he writes.

NY Times -While the number of office buildings reaching critical stages of distress remains small, the figure has increased sharply this year. And investors, lawyers and bankers expect the pain to grow in the coming months because demand for office space remains weak and interest rates and other costs are higher than they have been in many years. The problems could be especially severe for older buildings with lots of vacant space and big loan repayments coming up.The repercussions could extend far beyond the owners of these buildings and their lenders. A sustained drop in the value of commercial real estate could sap property tax revenue that cities like New York and San Francisco rely on to pay salaries and provide public services. Empty and nearly empty office buildings also hurt restaurants and other businesses that served the companies and workers who occupied those spaces.