A Boring Dystopia

There are wide swaths of dt Manhattan that are completely empty rn. Floors and floors of high rises. A lot of them are on 10 year leases so they're just being paid still while no one uses them but when they all go up it's gonna be interesting.

The current corrupt mayor refused to rezone them for residential and did a big RTO campaign that fell flat. They'll keep them empty even after rents end or try to figure out ways to rent whole floors to the mega rich. They'll never convert them to normal housing as it will lower the value of their skyscrapers. Instead they'll continue to lobby for RTO politicians to ensure businesses force back people to work in them.

I agree completely with your comment. Including the rage at the end lol

Exactly. Are they the solution? Yeah but not at 1k + Utilities and BJ a month.

No: converting commercial space to residential is more expensive than building new residential

Everything I'm seeing says the answer just isn't as simple as you're stating here in your post.

• Are ALL office buildings good conversion candidates for residential? No.
• Are ALL office buildings bad conversion candidates for residential? Also, no.
• Are there a measurably high enough number of office buildings that are good candidates for conversion for residential? Yes!

The more accurate answer is in the middle. Not all office buildings are created equal, and not all cities have excess land meaning there higher conversion costs are still worth it over building new residential. According to one study of 1000 office buildings evaluated in cities across the USA and Canada, 25% were good candidates for cost effective conversion to residential. Keep in mind this can include both small office buildings as large ones. source

"Now, developers in the city have five office conversion projects underway and 10 more in development, Paynter noted in his blog. He said he expects these initiatives to increase the number of residential units there by 24%. "

"The success in Calgary has prompted over a dozen cities and more than 100 building owners across North America to seek similar solutions for their struggling Class C and B buildings, Paynter said in the blog post. Projects including Franklin Tower in Philadelphia; 1 St. Clair West in Toronto, Ontario; and The Residences at Rivermark Center in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, show how outdated office buildings can be reconfigured into amenity-rich residential communities, adding value to the cityscape, Paynter wrote."

In some cities even if the cost of conversion may be higher than building new residential, it may still be worth it to do conversion instead of new build simply because there isn't land free in the right places. source I postulate in these cases, building new residential would also have to include the cost of demolishing the existing office building to reclaim the land which suddenly would make conversion cheaper again.

"Manhattan not only sees the most conversions at present, but it also has the most office space meeting our criteria for future conversion potential, and so we expect it to remain the leading market for OTM conversions."

From all sources I found the best office buildings to convert are actually older and smaller ones that are decades old, not new ones. Not only are the older office buildings easier/cheaper to convert these are also less attractive to businesses which prefer newer building designs and flexibility. This is one of those narrow cases where its beneficial to both groups. There are no losers in these specific cases.

Like may things in life, there isn't one simple answer, and that appears to be the case here.

Not to mention the like 12 empty houses per homeless person.

This bullshit is just some vulture capitalist's foolproof scam to make a quick buck in a floundering corporate real estate market.

Which is why developers do it. To lose money.

Because these idiots are comparing it to the normal sized flats, that are more expensive due to the deficit they created.

yup. they are the one who profit from the housing crisis worldwide.

we would have to go through them to solve it anyway. might as well take out the guilliotines.

Exactly. Not sure how slum lord flats are the solution here, when investment firms are sitting on millions of empty homes.

To fit more units, and make more money.

So they can make as much money as possible

For every rental, there is at least one landlord. In and of itself, this isn't a bad thing. Some people don't want to own homes, and would rather rent. There should be that option. Option. Not the only possibility. There are not enough ownable homes, because too many are owned by investment firms that keep them deliberately empty to drive up prices. Real estate investing should be heavily regulated, and, yes, this includes over landlords.

Outlaw AirBnB and corporate ownership of residences or the amount of housing will literally never matter.

While true, in the USA, there are millions of "investment homes" owned by investment firms, all sitting empty, driving down supply and driving up costs. The solution to the housing market in this instance isn't to increase the availability of 150sqft slum lord flats, but instead to significantly decrease the number of "investment homes" an entity is allowed to own [and to restrict its use (for example, it must not sit empty for more than 6 months)].

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It's student accomodation - short term , probably ok for youths for whom sharing with strangers as part of the "experience".

That's no place for putting down roots, or for a full time worker. It's not a bad idea in principle - i agree. But each unit should be 2-3 times the size and include a private shower room, toilet. and at least a small kitchenette. And the conversion should be nominally permanent - i.e. require a plaanning application to reverse.

That plan doesnt even have a washbasin/water supply. My guess is they want to cheap out on plumbing - hence the communal bathroom and kitchen. So that it is reversible back to office space - they're not building a home if they want it reversible - it's temporary "accomodation". No good for a lasting comunity. I'd want this type of accomodation to be no more than a few percent of the homes in an area.

To me the fact they scaled down the plan of the "traditional studio" to make their plan look bigger betrays the fact that these are disingenuous salespeople not actually interested in making viable homes for people.

edit: It's also fine for housing the homeless - no argument there, but I'd hope for them a pathway to adequate long term accomodation.

While I'm not fully on board with this idea, I do think it could help some people out. When I got my first job out of college, I definitely couldn't afford to live anywhere aside from my parents house. All my friends were in the same boat and even with our meager salaries together, we could not afford to get an apparent together. It took us 3-4 years out of college to have the salary to be able to come together and get an apartment. But what if you moved to a new place and don't have friends to share with? What if you just... Don't have friends or have some reason you can't live with others? This is a great solution for that. My brother was in a situation recently where he felt stuck in a relationship with his batshit crazy girlfriend because he couldn't afford to be on his own and would have to move in with our parents if they broke up. It eventually worked out and he has an apartment all his own, but I feel he could have removed himself from that relationship sooner if there was a cheap option like this for him to use temporarily.

A lot of American municipalities have banned a lot of the cheap and small apartments that could house working people. Offer it as an option; it seems better than sleeping on the streets.

No. It's not a lack of existing housing. It's lack of available housing. Millions of homes sitting empty, owned by these firms as investment properties.