Savills Studley Research
New York City
Savills Studley Report
New York City office sector
Q2 2018
SUMMARY
Market Highlights
in Class A rent.
AVAILABILITY RATE HOLDS STEADY
Manhattan’s overall availability rate was unchanged, remaining at 11.7%. The Class A availability rate fell by 50 basis points to 12.7% but this was balanced out by a 50 basis point increase in the Class B and C availability rate to 10.8%.
"Even as WeWork and other shared office providers absorb commodity space, many landlords are still saddled with space on lower floors. The only way to lease these less appealing floors in a competitive market is to be aggressive with pricing."
LEASING SPIKES
Leasing volume totaled 10 million square feet (msf) in the second quarter, as five leases over 300,000 sf were completed.
Bill Montana, Senior Managing Director
RENT FLAT
INVESTMENT SALES RISE
"Coworking space has surprised nearly everyone. The proliferation of shared office space has been impressive. Its current pace of expansion is unsustainable, though. At some point, even without the test of a recession, this sector will reach a saturation point, spurring some retrenchment."
Manhattan’s average asking rent ticked down from $73.88 to $73.85 during the second quarter. Rent has declined by 1.4% compared to mid-year 2017. Midtown's Class A average rent increased by 1.2% to $89.38, but Midtown South (down by 2.1% to $108.70) and Downtown (down by 2.1% to $68.26), both posted quarterly decreases
Based on office property sales during the first half of the year, 2018 is on track to exceed transaction activity during 2017. Investment sales soared to just over $9 billion, compared to the previous six month total of $6.7 billion.
Joe Genovesi, Executive Managing Director
Savills Studley Report | New York City
Coworking the new Telework?
In the early days of the internet, back when modem dial-ins were audible, you could also hear a lot of predictions that time was running out for traditional office space. Businesses and their employees would surely opt to work from home. For a while, some of the largest U.S. businesses implemented teleworking. Over the last five to six years, though, many of these firms have ended their experimentation with teleworking – including Honeywell, Yahoo, HP and IBM. They have clearly concluded that a base of operations reinforcing company culture and fostering collaboration is essential to succeeding in an innovation economy.
Office-Using Employment Trends
Millions
- 1.60
- 6%
1.40 1.20 1.00 0.80 0.60 0.40 0.20 0.00
4% 2% 0% -2% -4% -6% -8% -10%
Coworking is the new teleworking, the latest candidate to displace traditional office space. Not that long ago the consensus view was that coworking would be a short-lived craze. The onslaught of WeWork and rise of newer models such as Industrious, Knotel and Innovate have changed that perspective. Coworking is exceeding most people’s expectations, influencing landlords in nearly all major markets. Estimates that shared space will some day take over 30% or perhaps half of the traditional office market have swung too far in the other direction. Shared office space will have a more lasting impact on the workplace than teleworking, but it will not supplant conventional leasing any time soon.
- NYC Off. Emp.
- NYC (% Annual Change)
- U.S.(% Annual Change)
Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics
Availability Rate Trends (All Classes)
Overall Availability Rate Trends
15% 10%
5%
14.5%
12.6%
11.3%
11.4%
9.5%
8.7%
Shared office space is not the best option for most established businesses. On a per desk basis, the cost is much higher. Nevertheless, shared office providers are offering distinctive cultures and a suite of services to their members. WeWork, for example, has deployed some of its funds to acquire software and services that it offers to members. In 2017 it acquired coding academy Flatiron School. It recently started a Services Store, offering members discounted subscriptions to Adobe, Lyft, Slack and Uplift. This blending of learning opportunities and “grab and go” IT solutions is ideal for micropreneurs or small businesses.
- Midtown
- Midtown South
- Downtown
0%
- Q2 '17
- Q3 '17
- Q4 '17
- Q1 '18
- Q2 '18
Asking Rent Trends (All Classes) ($/sf)
Overall Rental Rate Trends
$100
$80 $60 $40 $20
$0
Shared office space providers have transformed the level of services offered to small businesses and individual members, but they will never be as tailored as the internal support within a company. Established firms have internal support teams performing roles in a more efficient and cost effective manner that aligns intimately with the core company mission.
$80.00
$78.52
$78.29
$72.80
$64.44
$63.56
Don't Overestimate the Upside
Coworking space is ideal for businesses that are highly uncertain about their space and staff requirements a year or two out – providing the flexibility to scale up or down as needed. Demand from established businesses requiring
- Midtown
- Midtown South
- Downtown
- Q2 '17
- Q3 '17
- Q4 '17
- Q1 '18
- Q2 '18
02
Q2 2018
an entry point to a market or swing space supports enterprise coworking. WeWork has made headway capturing some significant leases from the likes of IBM, Amazon and MercedesBenz, but the jury is still out on how much the enterprise business or other models like Knotel will encroach on traditional leasing.
Availability Rate Comparison
Rental Rate Comparison ($/sf)
City Hall
Park Ave S./Madison Square
Flatiron
5.9%
7.3%
Hudson Yards
$108.32
$99.09
$94.05 $91.85
$82.78
Plaza North
7.7%
8.3% 8.4%
Greenwich Village
Soho
Greenwich Village
Union Square Midtown South Times Square Columbus Circle
Penn Plaza/TSQ South
Chelsea
Plaza South
9.5%
Times Square Union Square Midtown South
Midtown
$79.10 $78.75 $78.52 $78.29 $78.24 $75.37 $74.20 $73.85 $73.46 $71.06 $68.88 $68.85
$65.12 $64.54 $64.40 $63.56
10.0% 10.5% 10.5% 10.9% 11.1% 11.4% 11.7% 11.9% 12.6% 12.6%
Fractional office space providers align with only a fraction of the market, but it is a rapidly growing portion that has the attention of some investors. The amount of coworking space in Manhattan will likely approach 8.0 msf or roughly 2% of existing office stock by year-end 2018 – as a percentage of office-using workers, though, shared office space probably only accounts for 1% to 1.5% of office workers. More than 1.0 million people in Manhattan work in offices; estimating how many are using shared office space is a challenge. The industry lacks a reliable statistic such as average daily occupancy rates. WeWork has quoted occupancy of 90% and has a waiting list at some facilities. Considering that Manhattan comprises about 20% of the company's global footprint, it may hit its upper limit here before it does elsewhere.
Chelsea
Grand Central
Midtown
Columbus Circle Hudson Square
Manhattan
Manhattan Plaza South
Grand Central
Tribeca
Hudson Yards Financial District
Tribeca
WTC/Brookfield Place
Park Ave S./Madison Square
Flatiron
14.4%
Soho
14.5% 14.5% 14.6%
Downtown
East Side/UN
Penn Plaza/TSQ South
Downtown
Plaza North
Hudson Square
U.S. Index
15.7%
17.9% 18.2%
19.8%
Financial District
City Hall
$57.77
$53.13
WTC/Brookfield Place
East Side/UN
U.S. Index
$34.06
- 0%
- 5%
- 10%
- 15%
- 20%
- 25%
$0 $15 $30 $45 $60 $75 $90 $105 $120
Major Transactions
- Tenant
- Sq Feet
800,000 407,000 360,000 346,607 320,000 180,000 150,000 144,000 138,000 136,000
- Address
- Market Area
- Pfizer
- 66 Hudson Blvd
- Hudson Yards
Latham & Watkins Discovery Inc.
1271 Avenue of the Americas 230 Park Ave S
Columbus Circle Union Square
Bailout for Commodity Space
- J. Crew
- 225 Liberty St
- WTC/Brookfield Place
Greenwich Village Plaza II
Although it is a small portion of office occupancy in Manhattan, coworking nevertheless has made the difference between negative and positive absorption in the last several quarters. Since the start of 2017, net absorption in Manhattan has totaled just over 3.0 msf – coworking firms have leased at least 2.7 msf in this same period. Without the several msf leased by WeWork and a long list of other providers in the last few years, availability would be at least another 100 basis points higher, approaching 13%, and the highest mark since the recession. Additionally, shared office space providers have become the core tenants for lower floors; they have been the ultimate commodity space bailout. An analysis of 6.2 msf of coworking space in Manhattan found that 59% of the space they occupy (3.6 msf) was on base floors (10th floor or below).Without these leases, many landlords would have been saddled with lower floors that can rarely command a premium. Buildings without the luck to ride the wave of coworking, particularly those with big blocks of commodity space, have to be aggressive. As of mid-year, 19.2 msf of the 50.1 msf available space was contained below the 10th floor.
- Facebook^^
- 770 Broadway
First Republic Bank** NYU Langone Medical Center^^ Touro College
1230 Avenue of the Americas
- One Park Ave
- Park Avenue South
Penn Plaza/Times Square South Columbus Circle Columbus Circle
320 W 31st St
- Blank Rome
- 1271 Avenue of the Americas
- 1325 Avenue of the Americas
- McGraw Hill Education
- Sum of Top Leases
- 2,981,607 Sum of 2nd Quarter Leasing Activity 10 MSF
*Renewal **Renewal & Expansion ^^Expansion
Future Fallout?
rising supply. Activity in newly constructed or reconstituted prime buildings with extensive amenities and efficient layouts has been strong, but landlords have to be aggressive to lease commodity space.
Coworking has bailed out some landlords. What would happen, though, if there was a major reversal in the economy, a dropoff in membership and the closure of a high number of centers? The top coworking firms are receiving hefty improvement allowances and coworking buildouts are not easily transferable back to a vanilla shell. As long as coworking providers stay for two to three years, landlords will recoup their investment.
Even as office employment is growing, many employers are shrinking their footprint. The bulk of this densification may be over, but examples of still take place nearly every quarter. Deutsche Bank, for example, is close to signing a 1.1-msf at One Columbus, but it will eventually vacate 1.66 msf at 60 Wall Street. AllianceBernstein Holding LP made its headquarters move from Manhattan to downtown Nashville official. Manhattan is expected to lose at least several hundred positions while Music City gains 1,000. The firm leases nearly 1.0 msf at 1345 Avenue of Americas. Additionally, automation anxiety, the fear that AI and robotics will eliminate thousands of jobs, has real relevance for the banking sector. Citigroup recently said that it could cut up to 10,000 technology and operations staff in the next five years due to automation.
Like other new innovations the ultimate market share of shared office space is not known, but this growth path seems unsustainable. Even without a recession, coworking will reach a saturation point in the next several years, forcing some level of retrenchment in the footprint of these trailblazers. The negative impact of any such pullback in the coworking space should be containable - unless of course, it is a trigger event highlighting the fragility of other companies that are chasing the next big thing.
Banks Continue Efficiency Push
The rise of coworking coincides with the effort by landlords in most markets to differentiate their assets. This campaign is particularly intense in Midtown and Lower Manhattan where choppy demand is struggling to keep up with
savills-studley.com/research 03
Savills Studley Report | New York City
Leasing Activity
Available SF
Availability Rate
Asking Rents Per SF*
- Map
- Submarket
- Total
pp
- %
- %
Change from Last Qtr. (1)
SF
(1000's)
This Quarter
Change from Last Qtr.
Year Ago
This Quarter
Year Ago
This Quarter
Change from Last Qtr.
Year Ago
This Quarter
Columbus Circle
27,548 19,453 32,586 28,190 7,413 6,106 54,247 8,068 28,593 22,080 42,065 36,987 66,999 36,776 3,005
783
825 769 326 268 855 825
1,165
134 233 206
1,232 1,188 1,102
614
4
2,885 1,811 3,245 2,629
932
-13.9% -21.1%
7.4%
2,774 2,008 2,728 2,030
706
10.5% 9.3%
-1.7% -2.5% 0.7% 1.1% -0.8% -0.1% 0.4% 0.5% 0.6% 0.8% -1.3% -1.8% -0.2% -0.7% -0.2% 0.0% -0.6% -10.2%
0.9% 0.0% 0.5% N/A
9.4% 10.1% 7.7%
$75.37 $82.25 $79.10 $84.65 $108.32 $109.99 $64.40 $84.46 $99.09 $103.85 $82.78 $86.38 $73.46 $83.44 $64.54 N/A
-0.9% 3.1% -2.1% -3.8% 4.1% 0.0% 4.6% 2.5% 0.1% 0.2% 2.8% 4.4% 3.7% 7.7% -9.6% N/A
$76.47 $79.55 $77.26 $84.19 $91.48 $100.53 $63.73 $90.05 $99.67 $104.28 $87.95 $89.84 $73.18 $80.28 $62.53 N/A
1234567
Columbus Circle - Class A
Times Square
10.0%
- 9.3%
- Times Square - Class A
Hudson Yards
13.5% -5.6% -0.8% 3.8%
6.6%
12.6% 14.7% 10.5% 9.7%
17.1% 17.2% 9.1%
Hudson Yards - Class A
Penn Plaza/Times Square South
Penn Plaza/Times Square South - Class A
- 897
- 484
5,684
780
5,140
- 835
- 5.3%
- 9.9%
Plaza North
4,174 3,605 5,021 4,112 7,467 3,789
595
- 4.4%
- 4,353
3,814 6,009 5,420 9,255 5,752
54
14.6% 16.3% 11.9% 11.1% 11.1% 10.3% 19.8% 21.2% 10.9% 37.1% 7.7%
14.6% 16.6% 13.7% 14.0% 12.7% 14.4% 0.9%
Plaza North - Class A
Plaza South
5.0% -9.6% -13.9% -1.6% -6.5% -0.8% 0.0%
Plaza South - Class A
Grand Central
Grand Central - Class A
East Side/UN
8
9
East Side/UN - Class A
Chelsea
- 0
- 166
- 1
- 0.2%
16,842 1,051 13,346
858
257 27
1,834
390
-5.3% -21.5% 13.1% 0.0%
1,930
376
10.8% 34.8% 8.2%
$78.24 $134.07 $65.12 $80.00 $68.85 $98.00 $78.75 N/A
-1.8% 1.7% -4.4% N/A
$69.97
- N/A
- Chelsea - Class A
10 Flatiron
Flatiron - Class A
357 N/A 361 N/A 738 N/A 384
7
1,022
58
1,153 N/A
$65.39
- N/A
- 6.7%
- 0.0%
11 Park Ave South/Madison Square
23,300 3,413 7,575 N/A
1,695 N/A
- 8.2%
- 1,747
40
- 7.3%
- 7.1%
- -0.4%
N/A
$67.43
- N/A
- Park Ave South/Madison Sq. - Class A
- 0.0%
- N/A
- 1.1%
Union Square
12
- 636
- -8.5%
N/A
- 613
- 8.4%
- -0.8%
N/A
- 8.0%
- 3.6%
N/A
$73.90
- N/A
- Union Square - Class A
- N/A
- N/A
- N/A
- N/A
Greenwich Village
13
7,234
935
- 604
- -12.8%
-1.4% -12.6%
0.0%
- 499
- 8.3%
- -1.2%
-0.2% -2.3% -3.4% -0.6% 0.0% 5.7% N/A
- 5.9%
- $94.05
$147.78 $74.20 $73.25 $91.85 $107.79 $71.06 N/A
4.0% N/A
$76.12
- N/A
- Greenwich Village - Class A
- 169
- 72
- 18.1%
15.7% 19.4% 14.5% 46.6% 14.4% N/A
8.6%
14 Hudson Square
Hudson Square - Class A
15 Soho
8,494 2,065 4,235
238
250 106 157 N/A
5
1,332
401
1,006
248
- 9.9%
- 0.0%
-3.4% 3.1% -0.2% 2.9% N/A
$81.01
- N/A
- 0.0%
- 612
- -4.1%
N/A
- 704
- 14.5%
46.6% 9.9%
$76.91 $116.65 $75.53 N/A
- Soho - Class A
- N/A
- N/A
16 Tribeca
4,905 N/A
- 707
- 66.1%
N/A
604
- Tribeca - Class A
- N/A
168 N/A 909 761 666 460
5,741 4,004 2,504
140
1,747 1,221
9,993 5,366
- N/A
- N/A
- N/A
17 City Hall
3,862 N/A
- 227
- -17.9%
NA
- 297
- 5.9%
- -1.3%
N/A
- 7.3%
- $53.13
N/A
-0.6% N/A
$54.95
- N/A
- City Hall - Class A
18 WTC/Brookfield Place
WTC/Brookfield Place - Class A
19 Financial District
Financial District- Class A
1-8 Midtown
- NA
- N/A
- N/A
- N/A
32,857 21,821 47,566 21,938 262,455 158,442 81,026 8,559 89,189 43,759
432,671 210,760