If landlords can’t pay back loans on office buildings, the lenders will suffer. Some banks are trying to avoid that fate.
Hard times are likely ahead for a lot of people. Mind your expenses and plan to save where possible just in case. Apologies for having a doomer outlook; I’m very cynical about capitalism, especially in the USA.
Commercial real estate, likely a restructuring due to folks not returning to the office. Been a downward trend since before Covid. Initial downturn was corps leaving downtowns, minor spike in 2022 and trending south.
No one wants to take the upfront cost of renovation. Corporate buildings aren’t an easy conversion into normal apartments. Plumbing especially is very different.
I’ve seen estimates that it’s frequently cheaper to demolish the building and build a new one.
It really just isn’t possible for most ooffice buildings. Think about how many bathrooms/kitchenettes are on a floor of any office building. You would have to likely double or triple that number to convert to housing, which is an absolutely insane and expensive prospect that would require gutting the entire building and resoing the entire plumbing and electric systems. It’s chraper to jist tear the fuckers down and build something made for condos/apartments.
Not sure why creating very affordable housing for extremely low income/homeless, that share a communal bathroom/kitchen on each floor would be such a hard sell? Hostel mentality? Feels like there’s still room for at least one in every major city.
Not a solution for all commercial real estate obviously.
