cavalryyy t1_j63kis1 wrote on January 27, 2023 at 1:49 PM

Reply to comment by LikesBallsDeep in Mayor Adams unveils proposal to convert Midtown offices into apartments by psychothumbs

I’m super on board with the idea of the conversions, but I’m curious how do you think they could handle the “everyone but me” mentality? Afaik it’s not like we have 60% of office buildings completely full and 40% completely empty. So if you own an office building and you hear that all the government is trying to get all the offices near you to close down, then by saying “okay everyone but me should close down, I’m going to stay open” you can usurp all their business.

Of course, it becomes highly irrational when everyone has this mentality, but it’s the same reason that people speed in traffic and cause more traffic. If everyone agrees, then everything’s great. But if everyone agrees, then the best strategy for me specifically is to not agree. But then this is true for everyone, so in reality no one (or a lot of people) decline.

LikesBallsDeep t1_j64bt96 wrote on January 27, 2023 at 4:53 PM

Sure, there's a bit of playing chicken with your competition.

If you and every other office owner are in the same boat, the question is do you convert first and lose less money waiting, maybe get more incentives, tap into the housing market when supply is still tight, or do you wait till your competitors do it and remove their office inventory from the market, maybe making yours more attractive again.

I think market dynamics have their faults but they're pretty good at finding that balance through pricing pressure, so I don't actually see this dilemma as a major concern. Or at least, it's not a reason to move forward with these conversions as an option.