On the 31st floor of what was once a towering office building in downtown Manhattan, construction workers lay down steel bracing for what will soon anchor a host of residential amenities: a catering station, lounge, fire pit and gas grills.
The building, empty since 2021, is being converted to 588 market-rate rental apartments that will house about 1,000 people. “We’re taking a vacant building and pouring life not only into this building, but this entire neighborhood,” said Joey Chilelli, managing director of real estate firm Vanbarton Group, which is doing the conversion.
Across the country, office-to-housing conversions are being pursued as a potential lifeline for struggling downtown business districts that emptied out during the coronavirus pandemic and may never fully recover. The conversion push is marked by an emphasis on affordability. Multiple cities are offering serious tax breaks for developers to incentivize office-to-housing conversions — provided that a certain percentage of apartments are
