Submitted by psychothumbs t3_10m4aoz in nyc
Comments
smackheadmuppet t1_j61xqw1 wrote
I miss the weirdness of that building
Thermus t1_j63rmmt wrote
They spent something like a billion dollars renovating it as offices like 5 years ago! I think they are gonna lean into that
KaiDaiz t1_j613ycd wrote
Big if its financially feasible to convert to housing vs tear down/rebuild and even bigger if its going to be affordable housing. You taking some of the most expensive dollar per sf commercial commercial space and you expect owners to convert it into affordable housing? lol
AluminumKnuckles t1_j618bye wrote
The spaces will be easier to fill than offices. Better to have some income than none. I agree it would be a stretch to make it affordable housing, but maybe that'd work better in the mid to low rise office buildings.
KaiDaiz t1_j619hww wrote
I say if we want to build mass affordable housing...we are looking at the wrong place to build it. Rather spend the zillions of subsidies and forgo taxes from abatements. Use that fund and energy to build many more affordable housing units in the cheaper 1hr+ zones from midtown.
There you get affordable housing. Look at the housing crisis post ww1 and ww2. We didn't build a ton of housing just in Manhattan. we expanded and built massively in the outer boroughs. That's what ease the housing crisis. Its no coincidence most housing in bk were built in the 1920-40s and most in queens in the 50s and up
Dragon_Fisting t1_j61n4qf wrote
The pain point this solves is that the offices are empty. People just will not ever go back to work in the same numbers as they did pre-pandemic no matter how hard the JP Morgan CEO whines. We need to do something with that unoccupied space, and what better than to make Midtown a neighborhood instead of a sterile cubicle farm again.
Evening_Presence_927 t1_j62ga22 wrote
Won’t we just run into the same problems that happens to current luxury housing stock? Foreign millionaires and billionaires are going to buy one or two of them and never use them for investment purposes, meaning it won’t actually go to the middle and working class people who actually need affordable spaces.
zaptrem t1_j62isft wrote
If you actually flood the market that demand will quickly be met.
Evening_Presence_927 t1_j64ej3h wrote
The market isn’t flooding with affordable units, though, so the demand isn’t being met anyway.
koreamax t1_j69ik2x wrote
Everyone I know that's applied for affordable housing has gotten it
Evening_Presence_927 t1_j69j7ij wrote
How many people is that?
koreamax t1_j69l4cl wrote
My wife and I, two other couples, one couple who each got it in the same building so they have their own apartments (its kinda weird) and a single co worker. Obviously its a small number, but part of the issue with affordable housing is you have to apply....it isnt just handed out.
Evening_Presence_927 t1_j69ls12 wrote
That’s not the issue at all, but okay.
Have fun with your anecdotal evidence.
koreamax t1_j69tz08 wrote
So what's the issue? My antidotal evidence is better than your lack of evidence
Evening_Presence_927 t1_j69v52p wrote
Lack of evidence? My evidence is the average rent in the city. Do you really expect someone to afford a $3000 apartment on minimum wage? Lmao
koreamax t1_j6a4b4h wrote
Average rent is such a misleading number. Not everyone is entitled to live in Midtown. I don't, I live in an outer borough because I can afford it. Does your average account for standard deviation?
Evening_Presence_927 t1_j6a5fmm wrote
Yes? It’s not just midtown. It’s everywhere, bro. Get out of your bubble.
koreamax t1_j6a5oa0 wrote
Get outside of my bubble? Projecting much?
I don't live in Midtown. What are you even talking about?
Evening_Presence_927 t1_j6a7n6o wrote
Neither do I. I’m probably in the part of Manhattan that’s the closest to livable for a DINK household anyway.
Dragon_Fisting t1_j659dh8 wrote
These units just intrinsically won't be worth as much.
Yes, developers tend to only build luxury housing, because they are greedy and want to maximize profit. But part of the reason they do that is because building anything is very expensive, so if they're going to build they might as well go all in and build expensive condos.
These would be different because the building is already there. The builder will avoid a lot of the costs, and on the flip side the units will be constrained by the existing building, which was built as cheaply as they could get away with because nobody cares how nice a cubicle farm is. It would make economic sense to build more sanely priced apartments and make a quick buck instead of tearing down the building to build more luxury. It's actually better for their short term profit for once.
Evening_Presence_927 t1_j65et82 wrote
> It would make economic sense to build more sanely priced apartments and make a quick buck instead of tearing down the building to build more luxury. It's actually better for their short term profit for once.
Based on what exactly? If anything, the flip will incentivize them more to make those apartments luxury, because the people in the area are rich anyway and they’ll probably already put a lot of money into plumbing the building and making sure it has apartment code safety measures.
[deleted] t1_j62ckbp wrote
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psychothumbs OP t1_j61s5n4 wrote
It's not going to be converted to affordable housing, just regular expensive market rate housing. The hope is that building more market rate housing will alleviate the housing shortage and put downward pressure on rents.
joyousRock t1_j625jac wrote
Yep, Can’t have more affordable housing without more housing
damnatio_memoriae t1_j62mu7i wrote
that's always the hope but have we ever seen that actually happen? i haven't seen it in my lifetime. these days giant real estate corporations control the supply. they can keep it low and prices high simply by sitting on units and not putting them on the market, and then use those vacancies to claim losses. it's a win-win for them to keep rents high even while building more units.
Fortisimo07 t1_j63gpri wrote
It very obviously happened during covid (although instead of cranking up supply, demand dropped). Landlords weren't able to "control the supply" in that case and prices dropped significantly
damnatio_memoriae t1_j64mrs7 wrote
sure but that's different. that happened because people left the city en masse, not because they built too many units -- and it didn't last. it happened post-9/11 too. demand for housing here is driven by the desirability of the city itself more than anything. when the city is desirable, which is like 98% of the time, then they can charge whatever they want and keep units vacant or off the market. when the city isn't desirable, they offer a couple months free and then rent goes right back up.
Fortisimo07 t1_j64puh7 wrote
Yeah but if they could truly control the supply like you're claiming, changes in demand wouldn't matter because as the demand went down they could just artificially limit the supply. They cannot do that (at least not to the extent that your claiming)
TheAJx t1_j645gr0 wrote
LMAO. It's not giant real estate corporations controlling the supply. Its local homeowners. There was one neighborhood activist group that fought to preserve a parking lot.
>they can keep it low and prices high simply by sitting on units and not putting them on the market, and then use those vacancies to claim losses. it's a win-win for them to keep rents high even while building more units.
This is also bullshit. Look up vacancy rates in New York.
Also, why do people think that landlords are playing this convoluted long con of keeping units off the market for long periods of time, earning zero rental income, in the hopes of earning more rental income sometime int he distant future? How does that work?
psychothumbs OP t1_j64enr1 wrote
The problem is it's not like there's just one landlord or just one developer. They are competing against each other in a market. The way they have controlled supply for many decades now is with legal restrictions on new supply.
09-24-11 t1_j63i41y wrote
If the city is able to convert these offices (and there are a lot of them) into expensive market rate apartments that is a step in the right direction. THEN the city and people can have the option to BUILD new affordable housing. So now there is housing stock for high, medium and low earners.
Will that happen? I fully doubt it. Every conversion and new project will be marketed to luxury renters and the “affordable” housing will be smaller/independent landlords.
Evening_Presence_927 t1_j62ghjc wrote
Isn’t the issue the same as the current market rate housing stock? Foreign millionaires and billionaires buying up one or two units for investments and never using them? How exactly is that going to create downward pressure on rents?
m1a2c2kali t1_j62jnza wrote
Well the foreign billionaires would be buying this unit instead of another unit?
psychothumbs OP t1_j63bygo wrote
Unused units like that are a pretty small proportion of the housing stock, and it's not like billionaires will buy more apartments in the city based on more being built.
kafkaesqe t1_j62oci4 wrote
Not if they’re rentals
Onion-Fart t1_j62oeq4 wrote
It would be nice if there was a law saying that you need to occupy a property for a certain amount of time per year to own it and not rent it
psychothumbs OP t1_j63cfz6 wrote
Or at least a vacancy tax
Evening_Presence_927 t1_j64esq7 wrote
If only Adams had the stones to propose that 🤔
psychothumbs OP t1_j64favt wrote
Yeah that's the last thing he wants - out of town property owners are his biggest constituents.
Head_Acanthisitta256 t1_j61y84e wrote
That hope is absolutely that, hope. If anything it’s a pipe dream with the moronic supply side housing theory.
psychothumbs OP t1_j622cxr wrote
The theory that increasing supply lowers prices?
Head_Acanthisitta256 t1_j6237f8 wrote
The theory that increasing HOUSING supply will lower market rate prices for a neighborhood. The market will artificially inflate market rate pricing to make a profit(by not even creating affordable housing). L.I.C. and Downtown Brooklyn for example.
The only way to create affordable housing is to ACTUALLY build affordable housing. Not exclusively build luxury or market rate units that only raises market rates in a neighborhood.
psychothumbs OP t1_j63c4sa wrote
Housing is not some magic exception to how supply and demand works. The way they are artificially inflating the market rate is by limiting supply, and that's what we need to change.
Head_Acanthisitta256 t1_j63cdil wrote
Limiting AFFORDABLE housing!!!!
psychothumbs OP t1_j63cksp wrote
Well supply of subsidized 'affordable' housing but also the supply of market rate housing, which results in the market rate not being affordable for many.
cucster t1_j63ev2u wrote
People should understand that any housing is better than no housing at all, even if all the offices become "luxury" housing, their existence will put downward pressure on all rents since People who xan afford may move there.
smackheadmuppet t1_j61tgrv wrote
Good luck renting that commercial space if it's not in Hudson Yards or right next to Grand Central. Manhattan Commercial is f*****d and everybody knows it.
CultofCedar t1_j62a198 wrote
My father was a city worker and worked near wall street before 9-11. After they built tower 4 the city had some kinda deal to lease a bunch of space to help fund it so his group (city auditors) were some of the first to move into it.
The old office building is now 180 Water iirc and cost like 5k a month lol.
snoberto77 t1_j61kd8b wrote
Affordable lmfao have u ever seen a price in NYC??
drpvn t1_j610qqn wrote
> The city has yet to release specific boundaries for the conversion plan, but a map in the task force's report highlights sections of Midtown where housing is barred.
This is the only thing close to such a map that I see in the hyperlink. This doesn’t look like a map that “highlights sections of Midtown where housing is barred.” This looks like an extremely small section of what I consider “midtown,” and mainly looks like downtown, Brooklyn, and Queens.
danuser8 t1_j61y7kb wrote
Blue and green color of map are probably people in mayor’s good list.
Rest of em are probably in his shit list
ikemr t1_j63gieu wrote
City sees problem. Proposes solution.
Ideologues: "it doesn't solve everything!!!!!"
uona1 t1_j63n6aw wrote
My main peeve is people treat an announcement like an actual accomplishment. Do what you say first then you get your props after the project is done
OrangeSlimeSoda t1_j60zdvu wrote
Realistically, converting office spaces into residential spaces (even if you can get past the zoning issues) would result in the office spaces becoming basically dormitories rather than actual housing. Office buildings simply aren't built to allow plumbing access to each office, for example, so communal bathrooms will be needed. Can you also imagine the mess that a communal kitchen would create? Upkeep and cleaning costs would go up. Many landlords may likely have clauses in their mortgages that their property can't be used for any purpose other than for office purposes; even if you can get around that, the potential damage that could be caused would make any refinancing institution balk.
EDIT: To expand, issues with the plan include:
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Structural issues: the buildings simply aren't suited for residential living. With how office buildings are structured, converting floors to dorms is a far more cost-effective and time-saving measure than to convert to a proper housing unit with a bathroom and kitchen space. It would be little better than temporary housing while new buildings are built (which is a good thing) if the City could even pull it off. But good luck getting a commercial landlord to agree to it.
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Legal: if a landlord doesn't want their building converted to residential use, the only thing the City could do is to seize the property which, under the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution, the government cannot do without providing adequate compensation. Can you imagine the cost to the City of either paying tens of billions for a temporary solution, AND having to pay for years of litigation? By the time the suits are resolved, new housing could be built.
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Health and safety: imagine the hygiene issues that would be associated with living in a dorm situation like this. Office buildings also aren't equipped to handle the kind of waste that residential buildings can. On top of this, can you imagine the safety issues? I wouldn't want to be woman living in a dorm-like situation like this.
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Contractual: many mortgage lenders will require that a property be used for a specific purpose, and it could be a default under the mortgage if a landlord converts it from office use to residential. A lender is unlikely to allow this conversion because (a) dormitory tenants are far less stable and less likely to provide regular rent revenue for the landlord to repay the loan; and (b) residential tenants cause greater wear-and-tear on the building and are more likely to cause damage (like a sewage issue or a fire).
The time, effort, and cost required to fight landlords and lenders and then convert is better served pursuing an aggressive re-zoning plan, at which point building new housing projects wouldn't take much more time than Adams' conversion plan, which is a short-sighted band-aid solution that doesn't stand up to a basic level of scrutiny.
Well, why would landlords want to just sit on empty buildings? Well, 2022 was the first year in which tenants have tried to get employees to come back into the office, and office occupancy hovers at just under 50%. As things get back to "normal", we will probably see a ceiling of office occupancy at 60%. But that doesn't mean that the space is useless. If lenders agree to it, those spaces could be converted to a variety of purposes - they could be used for classroom and education, medical uses like doctor and dentist offices, health purposes like fitness and dance studios, etc.
[deleted] t1_j61105g wrote
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[deleted] t1_j61ogzk wrote
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BroadwayBully t1_j63r3hg wrote
It’s the money mang they won’t want to pay the plumbers
brownredgreen t1_j610it1 wrote
What do YOU propose we do with empty office space in Midtown? Empty for the long haul as WFH shifts the landscape?
Its easy to be a critic. Its better to offer solutions.
OrangeSlimeSoda t1_j6118e5 wrote
There's no easy solutions; that's why there's a crisis. But that doesn't mean I shouldn't point out the problems with converting office to residential. If you close your ears to criticism, you'll just keep blundering into problem after problem.
Obviously this is a consequence of 20 years of administrative and municipal negligence. It's like climate change - anything we do now will take years to pay dividends. Here's a panel talk by experts in the field given at Fordham's law school late last year where they go into various issues contributing to the housing crisis: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9703JH3AX8&ab_channel=Fordhampcsinfo They basically don't think that converting office to residential is a feasible solution because you can't get the private sector on board with it, and these projects require a concerted effort by both the private and public sectors.
If office building owners don't want their property used for residential, what will the City do? Seize the property? That will mire the City in years of costly litigation, and by the time it's settled, new housing buildings could be halfway done.
LikesBallsDeep t1_j61h2mu wrote
Noone's forcing anything.
If you own an office building now and are losing a shit ton of money because it's mostly empty, this would just allow you (and maybe offer some incentives/zoning and code waivers) to convert it into apartments/condos so that you can stop losing a shit ton of money.
If you as the office owner prefer to keep it as an empty office and continue losing a shit ton of money, that's your god given right. It's also stupid, but being stupid is also your right.
ehsurfskate t1_j64jxb4 wrote
There is ALOT you are missing and assuming with your assessment here.
First off is you are assuming there is no cash flow at all for these office spaces. There is and return to office continues to tick up. If it keeps going and if there is an event like a white collar recession employees will be more willing to go in and will have less bargaining power.
The second is you are assuming it would be more profitable to go residential. There are huge construction costs to make this transition, plus downtime where the building is empty and design costs. Residential is also less money per sf by ALOT.
The last and most important point is the value of commercial space versus residential. If you convert a building not only do you lose SF to get legal light and air plus egress for each unit, you lose huge value on the sf you do keep. This drops the value of your overall portfolio which you use to gain credit and borrow with (to the tune of tens of millions). These buildings are not all about cash flow for owners. They are giant stores of wealth for credit and borrowing.
LikesBallsDeep t1_j667e6f wrote
You are stuck in 2019 world.
The old trend line of office space value is permanently gone. Adapt or perish.
Anyway, this is about allowing those that want to to do the conversion.
If you are right, nobody will want to, so no harm done, right?
ehsurfskate t1_j677lji wrote
I’m not stuck anywhere and in my profession change and churn equal profit, I also work from home 3 days a week so not sure what you are on about.
I’m not sure why you are assuming it’s permanently gone either. Just as it changed to more wfh it can change back again. I hope it doesn’t but if we hit a recession and people need work they will go into the office if required.
I’m not saying it should not happen. I hope it does. I was just adding some context to the wide eyed people of this sun who may not know much about the commercial real estate market inner working besides - yay wfh new paradigm and yay more housing
cavalryyy t1_j63kis1 wrote
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
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.
newestindustry t1_j614ly9 wrote
>If office building owners don't want their property used for residential, what will the City do? Seize the property? That will mire the City in years of costly litigation, and by the time it's settled, new housing buildings could be halfway done.
If the office buildings are empty, as they are now, why wouldn't the entities who own them want to allow for conversions to residential? Do you think they're going to wait around forever for office tenants who aren't coming?
OrangeSlimeSoda t1_j615jpd wrote
We're currently seeing carrot-and-stick attempts by office tenants to compel their employees back into the office. Office occupancy was at about 47% at the end of 2022, and probably won't go above 60%. What we will likely see is re-negotiated leases to the benefit of commercial tenants. We might see some of that space converted to other uses - yoga studios, medical offices, classrooms, etc.
There's a bunch of reasons why office landlords won't want their offices converted to residential. First, the cost of converting them into a dorm-like situation would offset the benefits. Second, their lenders might bring a lawsuit against them depending on what their mortgage says. Third, there's a bajillion liability issues that comes with it, in particular ensuring the physical safety of tenants (I can't imagine many single women would feel safe living like that). Fourth, there's a far greater likelihood of damage being done to the building if it's used for residential purposes. Fifth, existing commercial tenants won't like sharing the building with residents living in what are effectively dorms.
As I mentioned in another comment, trying to compel office landlords to convert will be an expensive and time consuming process. I think that that energy and cost is better served in an aggressive re-zoning effort, which is one of the major impediments to building affordable housing in the City.
newestindustry t1_j617n4v wrote
>There's a bunch of reasons why office landlords won't want their offices converted to residential.
All of these hinge on the offices being converted into dorms, which I have never seen anyone but you suggest will happen.
>As I mentioned in another comment, trying to compel office landlords to convert will be an expensive and time consuming process.
I think letting your office space sit empty while you look for nonexistent tenants is also an expensive and time consuming process.
OrangeSlimeSoda t1_j619f7d wrote
> All of these hinge on the offices being converted into dorms, which I have never seen anyone but you suggest will happen.
Because the cost of gut-renovating office spaces into fully-function housing units is cost-prohibitive. Merely from a physical standpoint, it would entail ripping down and re-erecting walls, re-wiring things, upgrading plumbing, providing gas, re-configuring things to work around elevator banks, etc. Turning them into dorms is the most cost-effective and expedient solution for a landlord.
>I think letting your office space sit empty while you look for nonexistent tenants is also an expensive and time consuming process.
The office landlords really don't have a choice. They are bound by legal obligations to their lenders, municipal regulations, and zoning laws to only allow their spaces for offices. It would be more expensive to convert the office space into a residential unit than to try to flip it to a different kind of office use.
newestindustry t1_j61bisc wrote
OK well I'm gonna be real with you, I think you kind of just made this whole dorm thing up. NYC has been converting office to residential in Lower Manhattan for decades now, none of them are dorms.
Needs0471 t1_j620vvv wrote
Yeah, this whole sub thread is just bullshit. It’s not like the task force that wrote the plan is ignorant of the very obvious challenges.
Evening_Presence_927 t1_j64dimr wrote
This is the same administration that wants to forcibly hospitalize homeless people without expanding outpatient care. I wouldn’t put it past them to be that stupid.
Revolio_ClockbergJr t1_j61monk wrote
> Merely from a physical standpoint, it would entail ripping down and re-erecting walls, re-wiring things, upgrading plumbing, providing gas, re-configuring things to work around elevator banks
These are all things they would do anyway. What else does “conversion” mean, if not these tasks?
Skip gas, do electric. Plumbing would be weird but nothing that hasn’t been done before.
Yes, dorms are more cost effective… until they sit empty like the offices.
Evening_Presence_927 t1_j64drl2 wrote
I think they’re saying it would take far more resources doing that than simply tearing the building down and doing it from scratch. Office buildings are built to hold, well, offices, not apartments.
LikesBallsDeep t1_j61hab6 wrote
Nobody's saying gut renos are cheap but.. have you seen the price of getting ANYTHING new built in NYC in general?
Very expensive can still be better than absurdly, astronomically expensive for a new build.
brownredgreen t1_j6137gt wrote
I dont believe that the private sector is the solution.
I dont care if they are on board.
Housing, like healthcare, is a 100% MANDATORY HUMAN NEED
Maybe having MANDATORY HUMAN NEEDS being a profit machine for.rich fucks is a bad idea.
If building owners want their property to sit vacant, that's their decision, sure.
We should definitely pass a Vacancy Tax tho, to encourage them to get on board.
They wanna just pay absurd taxes on empty buildings paying them no rent? Their.choice.
OrangeSlimeSoda t1_j614nrx wrote
I'm not arguing that housing is a mandatory right, but the plan simply isn't feasible because of (1) physical issues (i.e. how the building is built - and don't even get me started on the personal safety problems that this would cause) and (2) legal issues. If the private sector doesn't want to cooperate, then providing housing at all is far more difficult. The City doesn't build housing, but provides incentives for private companies to do it.
The State allowed a tax bill that provided a temporary tax abatement (not tax forgiveness, but abatement) expire without a replacement in 2022. That will further compound the crisis.
brownredgreen t1_j615dx0 wrote
The City is capable of building housing tho, right? They have outsourced that to private companies via incentives, but they COULD right?
Trying to find a way for the Owning class to squeeze money out of.people trying to have a roof over their head, is gonna end badly for everyone except the property owners.
Doesn't seem like a good plan.
akmalhot t1_j61ovyz wrote
have you seen nycha housing and management?
parkerpyne t1_j61ikz0 wrote
>The City is capable of building housing tho, right? They have outsourced that to private companies via incentives, but they COULD right?
With what money? Neither municipal, nor state nor federal have any. The US at the federal level alone is approaching a trillion dollars in interest payments this year. It's the least productive way to spend money and yet, everyone constantly looks at the administrations to solve problems. Every time they do it, that slice gets bigger.
damnatio_memoriae t1_j62njzo wrote
yeah but the property owners are the ones dictating the plan so it doesn't matter if it's a good plan or not, it's the plan we're gonna get.
valoremz t1_j624s6j wrote
Can someone elaborate on why anything has to be done with empty office space? I assume that whoever is leasing the space is still paying for it even if employees aren’t coming in, no?
I’m genuinely curious. What should a government do about empty offices that are not being used but are being paid for? And if they’re not being rented, then doesn’t that simply mean the landlord is still on hook for the monthly mortgage and property taxes?
damnatio_memoriae t1_j62nsq8 wrote
leases don't go on forever. we're nearly three years into the covid era. certainly leases have expired in that time or been broken, and as time goes on, surely more will expire.
[deleted] t1_j63bwxe wrote
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AluminumKnuckles t1_j6173sp wrote
Would still be faster and less expensive to fit out a building with the necessary plumbing than constructing all new residential towers from the ground up.
newestindustry t1_j6189xd wrote
This is common sense but all the smart guys here on r/nyc say otherwise.
LikesBallsDeep t1_j61gt7g wrote
The only real issue with office buildings is probably natural light. All the noise about plumbing etc, like you can't run new pipes.
Even if you have to reserve the middle 10% of the whole building going vertically the whole height and convert that into a utility shaft for new plumbing, garbage chutes, etc, so what?
As for the natural light issue, yeah you might need to be a bit creative with the floor plans. But this is a city where people willingly live in 10 ft wide railroad apartments so I think it's possible. And if it's really a problem, again, reserve the no light middle portions for amenities, or hell maybe even some creative commercial.
Personally, given how loud midtown is, I wouldn't mind having my living room on the window side of a unit and the bedroom deep toward the middle far from windows. Dark and quiet is a better sleep environment anyway.
cum-chatka t1_j63dnov wrote
It’s not like residential buildings aren’t usually also just rectangular with windows on the outside. Yes, converting will take a lot of effort but it’s a worthy effort
ehsurfskate t1_j64edp0 wrote
As a building design professional I wouldn’t say knowing how to convert class C office space to residential in a manner that makes financial and practical sense is “common sense”.
newestindustry t1_j64nf8e wrote
Damn, you should go tell your competitors who’ve gotten rich doing it in Lower Manhattan for decades that it’s impossible
ehsurfskate t1_j64qt2t wrote
Didn’t say was impossible or that I haven’t done renos. We can make anything happen it’s just time and money that needs to be paid by the owner. Also those lower Manhattan Reno’s you are talking about are few in quantity and are very different buildings than the giant midtown office.
Financially design professionals like me would make a killing on these, these cost more to design than new builds in most cases. I can just say I work with these building owners and the financial incentive for conversions of giant midtown offices is not there. If it was it would already be happening on a massive scale.
newestindustry t1_j64uhxv wrote
When you say "giant Midtown office", I feel like you are immediately thinking of the absolute hardest building to convert, but the plan is to make it easier to convert older smaller office buildings to residential. The stretch of Midtown that's specifically referenced in the article is full of tons of such buildings. This exact type of building has been converted to residential elsewhere in Manhattan.
As for the financial incentives—they aren't laws of nature, they're based on a status quo that everyone in the world knows doesn't exist anymore. They'll change and you'll make your killing. Get that paper!
oledirtycrustard t1_j66ouiw wrote
hey dummy - those aren't high rise office bldgs
newestindustry t1_j68wxh0 wrote
>When 70 Pine was built in 1932, it was the third tallest building in the world and served as the headquarters for the Cities Services Company in New York City. Today, the landmarked Art Deco building has been reborn as a modern residential building.
Might wanna Google stuff before you show your ass like this.
NewNewark t1_j64faqo wrote
This is an idiotic post. Source: Currently living in an office building that was converting to housing. Not only do I have a nice bathroom, I even have an in unit washer/dryer and dishwasher
Spirited_Touch6898 t1_j64bp9r wrote
>Office buildings simply aren't built to allow plumbing access to each office, for example, so communal bathrooms will be needed. Can you also imagine the mess that a communal kitchen would create? Upkeep and cleaning costs would go up. Many landlords may likely have clauses in their mortgages that their prop
What are you talking about, I know of at least a dozen buildings that underwent conversions. They usually convert them in to large luxury condos, and quite successfully. They have less than ideal floorplans, but overall its very good.
Here is a recent example:
TheAJx t1_j64cx77 wrote
> they could be used for classroom and education, medical uses like doctor and dentist offices, health purposes like fitness and dance studios,
The number of students in New York continues to shrink. The number of commuters in New York has shrunk as well which means the demand for doctors and dentists (people swinging by during lunch or after work) shrinks. Fitness and Dance studios . . . I guess so.
Overall there is not that much demand for commercial space now. I hear your point on the expenses of conversion, but what's wrong with dorm style housing?
There are a lot of people that already live in defacto dorm style housing anyway. Would it be that bad of an idea to offer something that is specifically tailored for that? I agree with you that commercial-to-residential conversions aren't the magic solution, but there is no one magic solution. I think these sort of conversions play a role. Dormitory style housing should be available in NY.
LunchMasterFlex t1_j61l3ma wrote
I don’t think we should progress as a society because it seems daunting. Therefore any new idea will be met by a mighty “harumph.” Harumph.
earlymountainrain t1_j61lnlc wrote
As much chance of this happening as there was of converting the bank owned foreclosures to affordable housing during the 2008 recession. Millions of units withered away as they couldn't unwind the tranches of properties bundled together as Residential Mortgage Backed Securities. This is just a robin hood fantasy and populist talking point.
PJChloupek t1_j61yb1s wrote
an unveiling of a proposal?! that’s only 4 degrees of separation from well implemented progress!!
/s
Comicalacimoc t1_j63wrev wrote
Good can we wfh now
Spirited_Touch6898 t1_j64a5y7 wrote
It's a great idea, they should've done that long time ago. Specifically where it makes sense, it maybe even a better idea to allow for a mix of office, and residential within one building, obviously with separate entrances. Apartments like that usually have bad floor plans, with windows in only one side of the apartment. Mostly works well for 2000 sqf apartments, where you want a walk-in closet the size of a bedroom, and efficient use of space is less important.
asian_identifier t1_j64kqy1 wrote
bring back the SROs
LastValyrian t1_j62hs4n wrote
Even if this is true, that shit won't be affordable anyway.
devolka t1_j63z558 wrote
Which stage of grief is this?
This feels like we are moving out of bargaining and into acceptance.
iknowyouright t1_j64cu3m wrote
Can't wait for $4k studio apartments with no walkable grocery stores!
NewNewark t1_j64f19d wrote
I can think of 10 office buildings in Newark that are now housing, including one currently under construction.
NYStaeofmind t1_j6b1mn1 wrote
It would not work. The plumbing needed for residential vs. commercial needs is problematic. Structural integrity could be compromised.
ooouroboros t1_j67jbdn wrote
Just more apartments for the top 01% to buy up and horde.
aced124C t1_j62yhl2 wrote
Finally! some advocating for the commonsense use of some of the obscene amount of vacant commercial space
[deleted] t1_j616yvn wrote
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werdnak84 t1_j61h3ob wrote
YOU CAN'T GET PEOPLE IN THE HOUSING MARKET IF THEY DON'T HAVE JOBS THAT PAY THEM SO THEY CAN BE ABLE TO AFFORD THE APARTMENTS, YOU IDIOT!!!!!!!
ext3meph34r t1_j61k5lr wrote
I used to work at the 335 madison avenue building. I thought to myself for the longest that this felt like a hotel. The interior center of the building was open space. You can look through a window and see all the other floors.
Come to learn that it was the biltmore hotel converted to office. I kinda want to see if converted back into a hotel.