Looks like it's getting to be a renters' market, at least where office space is concerned. The search for more reasonably priced digs has led firms like UniWorld, currently shacking up in an old printer's loft in western Soho, to downtown Brooklyn, reports the NY Times. Not that there's a whole lot of it to be had over here. "Although vacancy rates are rising in Manhattan, mostly because of layoffs in the financial industry, office space is actually becoming more scarce in Downtown Brooklyn," they write. "The vacancy rate there in modern, well-equipped buildings — what brokers refer to as Class A office space — fell to 7.9 percent in the third quarter, from 9.4 percent in the first quarter." Still, companies have signed leases for some 300,000 square feet of it this year, out of eight million that we have (Manhattan, on the other hand, has 180 million). And who's the big landlord welcoming companies to the borough of Kings? "Most of the Class A space is in MetroTech, a large office complex in Downtown Brooklyn that was built by Forest City Ratner from the early 1990s through 2005. The developer owns six office buildings, with 3.7 million square feet, in MetroTech’s 5.2 million square feet. JPMorgan Chase owns the other two office buildings in MetroTech. Forest City Ratner also owns three more Class A buildings near MetroTech, including a 19-story 700,000-square-foot tower called 1 Pierrepont Plaza."
Office Tenants Flee Manhattan Rents for Brooklyn [NY Times]
Photo by Shouting.
