Adaptive reuse and office-to-residential conversions are in the limelight.
During the past 30 months or so, buildings across the U.S. have been vacated. Many of those are office and other nonresidential buildings. Rather than tear down and rebuild on the lot, some locations are being reused and converted into residences and apartments.
As Axios calls it: “A solution for both empty downtowns and housing shortages.” The media outlet reviewed certain cities’ stances on adaptive reuse in a recent article.
New York City established the Office Adaptive Reuse Task Force to help balance the supply-demand disparity by recommending legal and regulatory changes to help convert unused office buildings for other uses that includes housing.
New York is one of a few cities researching this trend. Chicago, Los Angeles, Denver and Washington, D.C., are all in some fashion reviewing budgets, regulations and/or tax credits revolving around these types of projects.
The Real Estate Board of New York reports converting 10% of Class B and C offices could net roughly 14,000 units. Research from the RAND Corporation identified about 2,300 commercial properties in Los Angeles that could be converted into 72,000 to 113,000 housing units depending on the size.
Learn more about adaptive reuse and apartment conversions.