Those two are not as related as they at first seem.
For one, the plumbing required is different, as in literally offices don’t tend to have bathrooms with toilets and showers inside every office space. Also the lighting would be cut off for all the inside units. Communal bathrooms and no windows works for work but not as good for home.
For another, a lot of the varying housing crises (there are multiple types) relate to affordability bc of being bought up by corporate interests. Another type relates to weird zoning laws of what types of homes are allowed to be built in certain areas - and for these at least, there’s nothing stopping good homes from being made except again profits.
So it’s not impossible, but there are challenges. Mainly, how can already rich people find a way to make even moar monay? Oh yeah and something something the poors get whatever too.
Unfortunately only like 10% of them are viable for conversion. Office buildings and residential buildings have very different needs and it’s expensive as fuck to add all the extra shit needed for residences.
I would love to see an actual study proving it’s possible for only 10% of them because I’ve lived in a building built like an office one and I’ve done renovations in it and there’s very little that’s different from a residential building with concrete floors once everything’s been stripped down.
It’s even more expensive as fuck to build a residential building of the size of those office buildings as well and once converted is guaranteed income forever, no pandemic stops people from living in it and there’s always people willing to rent, contrary to businesses that can change their policies or simply go bankrupt.
But only around 10%-15% of office buildings nationwide can realistically be transformed to housing, according to economist Stijn Van Nieuwerburgh, a professor of real estate at New York’s Columbia Business School.
That’s what I’m saying, your source is from someone in a field unrelated to the one responsible to make the modifications, that’s like if you just gave me a quote by a geographer as a source for something related to computer science. The responsibility of finding a credible source for your number is still on you.
Buildings cost money. The whole point is that it isn’t economically viable to convert most buildings. My source is perfectly validly for the number I quoted. And if you need further convincing, watch the 60 minutes interview with the same guy. Not going to argue further with someone who clearly is arguing in bad faith.
There, I bothered finding the actual source, not just a number reported in an article
When you look at it you realize that it’s for NYC only, that they consider that current high occupancy means that a building can’t be converted, that they base it on current laws in place (which would change if the government wanted it to happen), they they automatically eliminate tons of buildings based on them being too recent or too small…
Also, they’re studying the financial feasibility and assume a whole lot of things (their own words), they’re not studying the physical feasibility which is what I was talking about. We’re talking about housing people, ROI isn’t the important part to homeless people or those who would love to live closer to their workplace but can’t afford it.
So in NYC there’s 10 to 15% of buildings that are FINANCIALLY viable conversions for a return on investment they consider acceptable. You can now stop saying only 10% of buildings can be converted as that’s not what they were trying to determine.
Not bad for someone arguing in bad faith huh? Or is arguing using unrelated studies is a way of arguing in bad faith on your part? 🤔
Those residential units will be worthless too if all the offices close. Why live in the big city and pay huge rents if you work remote? Just move to a cheap area and buy a nice house.
Those huge rents exist because demand exceeds supply (amongst other reasons). People want to live in walkable neighborhoods and not suburbs where you have to drive everywhere to survive.
Given the housing crisis, it only makes sense to convert that real estate into residential units.
Those two are not as related as they at first seem.
For one, the plumbing required is different, as in literally offices don’t tend to have bathrooms with toilets and showers inside every office space. Also the lighting would be cut off for all the inside units. Communal bathrooms and no windows works for work but not as good for home.
For another, a lot of the varying housing crises (there are multiple types) relate to affordability bc of being bought up by corporate interests. Another type relates to weird zoning laws of what types of homes are allowed to be built in certain areas - and for these at least, there’s nothing stopping good homes from being made except again profits.
So it’s not impossible, but there are challenges. Mainly, how can already rich people find a way to make even moar monay? Oh yeah and something something the poors get whatever too.
Unfortunately only like 10% of them are viable for conversion. Office buildings and residential buildings have very different needs and it’s expensive as fuck to add all the extra shit needed for residences.
I would love to see an actual study proving it’s possible for only 10% of them because I’ve lived in a building built like an office one and I’ve done renovations in it and there’s very little that’s different from a residential building with concrete floors once everything’s been stripped down.
It’s even more expensive as fuck to build a residential building of the size of those office buildings as well and once converted is guaranteed income forever, no pandemic stops people from living in it and there’s always people willing to rent, contrary to businesses that can change their policies or simply go bankrupt.
I come with receipts: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/converting-vacant-office-buildings-into-apartments-60-minutes/
An economist…
Get me an engineer’s or architect’s opinion and then I will give it some credibility.
I mean, you’re welcome to provide a source refuting mine from an engineer or an architect. I provided my source, where’s yours?
That’s what I’m saying, your source is from someone in a field unrelated to the one responsible to make the modifications, that’s like if you just gave me a quote by a geographer as a source for something related to computer science. The responsibility of finding a credible source for your number is still on you.
Buildings cost money. The whole point is that it isn’t economically viable to convert most buildings. My source is perfectly validly for the number I quoted. And if you need further convincing, watch the 60 minutes interview with the same guy. Not going to argue further with someone who clearly is arguing in bad faith.
https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w31530/w31530.pdf
There, I bothered finding the actual source, not just a number reported in an article
When you look at it you realize that it’s for NYC only, that they consider that current high occupancy means that a building can’t be converted, that they base it on current laws in place (which would change if the government wanted it to happen), they they automatically eliminate tons of buildings based on them being too recent or too small…
Also, they’re studying the financial feasibility and assume a whole lot of things (their own words), they’re not studying the physical feasibility which is what I was talking about. We’re talking about housing people, ROI isn’t the important part to homeless people or those who would love to live closer to their workplace but can’t afford it.
So in NYC there’s 10 to 15% of buildings that are FINANCIALLY viable conversions for a return on investment they consider acceptable. You can now stop saying only 10% of buildings can be converted as that’s not what they were trying to determine.
Not bad for someone arguing in bad faith huh? Or is arguing using unrelated studies is a way of arguing in bad faith on your part? 🤔
Those residential units will be worthless too if all the offices close. Why live in the big city and pay huge rents if you work remote? Just move to a cheap area and buy a nice house.
Those huge rents exist because demand exceeds supply (amongst other reasons). People want to live in walkable neighborhoods and not suburbs where you have to drive everywhere to survive.