Morgan Stanley

• February 2022 New York Commercial Real Estate Market Report
• Retail: Manhattan’s retail market is slowly making a comeback. Last quarter aggregate leasing velocity rose to about 1.86 million square feet. The figure is up 17% from the prior quarter, but still 14% below the prior year.The number of direct ground-floor availability in the fourth quarter decreased to 266 spaces from the 282 recorded in the third quarter, across the 16 retail corridors. On Broadway in SoHo, availability dropped 24% from 25 to 19 spaces. The average retail asking rent in those 16 retail corridors dropped about 1% to $597 per square foot or 8% below the prior year. This …
  
  
• June 2021 New York Commercial Real Estate Market Report
• Office: Companies that listed their offices for sublease are now pulling them off the market. At least 589,000 square feet of space that was offered for sublease has been delisted. Subleases now account for 30% of total vacant office space. 3.5 million square feet of office space was offered for sublease in the first quarter of the year, compared to 4 million square feet in the fourth quarter of 2020, and 4.6 million square feet in the third quarter of that year. Average asking rent was $72.97 a foot, down 0.4% from March and 8.3% from a year ago. Net …
  
  
• November 2020 New York Commercial Real Estate Market Report
• Manhattan Office: At the current rate of office leasing, leasing volume in 2020 would be the lowest in the last 20 years. The third quarter saw 4.81 million square feet of office leasing, just half of what was leased during the same time last year. The year’s total is 14.81 million square feet so far and is down 50% from the same period in 2019. There are 16.1 million square feet of Sublease space in Manhattan or 27% of the total available office space. This is a 47% increase year-over-year, far outpacing the 14% increase in direct space availability over …
  
  
• October 2020 New York New Developments
• New York New Developments Vacant office and retail space will have a domino effect on the city’s budget and economy. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority faces a $12 billion budget deficit by 2021. The low office numbers have also led to a projected $9 billion drop in sales tax and other revenues. About 24,000 New Yorkers have lost their lives to the coronavirus. The unemployment rate is 16% and just 10% of workers have returned to the office by September. Personal income tax revenue may drop by $2 billion this fiscal year. Only a third of hotel rooms are occupied, and …
  
  
• June 2020 New York Commercial Real Estate Market Report
• Office Office leasing was virtually dead, except for TikTok who just rented 232,000 at 4 Times Square. A few landlords have lowered prices. Many are taking a wait and see attitude until Tenants return to work and the dust has settled. Retail The brick and mortar apocalypse keeps getting worse, as more national chains declare bankruptcy or announce store closings. Mom and pop retail is faring far worse with many lacking reserves to stay in business. Restaurants will hurt even more, once they partially open and have to pay full rent. Sales Building sales were very very slow with only …
  
  
• April 2020 New York Buildings For Sale
• Buildings for Sale: Four years after receiving approval to build a 26-story, 310-key hotel at 1150 Sixth Avenue, developer Morris Moinian has decided to sell the vacant site instead. The midblock site is between West 44th and West 45th streets. It is a great development site with approved plans to build a hotel there, which a new owner could use or not. Brookfield Property Partners and Blackstone Group are reportedly in talks about a possible sale of One Liberty Plaza, a 2.3 million-square-foot office tower in the Financial District. Barneys has put its downtown Manhattan property at 101 Seventh Avenue …
  
  
• February 2020 New York Commercial Real Estate Market Report
• Total Manhattan office leasing activity was up 2.9% from last year, reaching 42.97 million square feet and up 28.4% above the ten-year average. Average asking rents dipped slightly to $78.75 at the end of the year, following a few large above-market deals. Midtown South had 16.41 million square feet in leasing activity, a 14.5% increase from 2019. With an overall average asking rent of $76.70. Midtown office leasing hit a new all-year high with 2,750,000 square feet in leases signed, up 58% year-over-year. Availability rate of 11.3%, with base rent average fell by nearly $2 to $87.003. Facebook’s 1.5 million-square-foot …
  
  
• January 2020 New York Commercial Real Estate Market Report
• The office leasing scene maintained momentum with just under 2.2 million square feet of deals in the ten largest leases. Facebook’s 1.5 million-square-foot lease at Hudson Yards accounted for more than half of that total. Facebook signed a lease at 30, 50 & 55 Hudson Yards for 1,500,000 square feet. The landlord is Related Companies. Dentsu Aegis Network signed a 15-year lease at 341 Ninth Avenue for 320,000 square feet. The landlord is Tishman Speyer. Morgan Stanley signed a new deal to expand its existing lease at 1 New York Plaza for 90,000 square feet. The landlord is Brookfield. New …
  
  
• December 2019 New York New Developments
• Major Developments: Tourism in New York City continues to rise but the Times Square submarket retail market has declined in retail pricing. Macy’s same store sales fell 3.9% at stores open for the last year. Target’s physical stores and online shop saw a 4.5% bump, with a 10% increase in clothing sales. The EB-5 program’s new federal regulations are in effect, and will double the minimum dollar amount that all foreign visa-seekers must put into development projects. Under the new regulations, investors must contribute $900,000 from the previous $500,000 for a project in a low employment zone. The investment amount …
  
  
• June 2017 New York New Developments
• Major Developments: Developer David Marx continues to put the pieces together for an upcoming Aloft hotel at 450 11th Avenue, refinancing the project with $67 million in loans. The de Blasio administration is finally moving forward with a proposal it announced 18 months ago to curtail the city’s emerging self-storage industry as part of City Hall’s plan to preserve middle-class jobs by regulating development in certain manufacturing zones. Several retail brands are on the lookout for large spaces in the borough, including discount clothier Primark. Former Mayor Michael Bloomberg donated $75 million towards the construction of the Shed, an arts …
  
  
• April 2017 New York Buildings For Sale
• New York Buildings For Sale: Ashkenazy Acquisition Corporation and DekaBank are looking to sell a newly redeveloped retail space at the base of 522 Fifth Avenue. The owners finished a $16 million renovation of the two vacant retail condominiums at the base of the 23-story, 380,000-square-foot office condo building. The two-floor retail condos together have 27,310 square feet, with about 10,850 square feet on the ground floor. The retail was valued at $277 million last year, when General Growth Properties sold its 10% stake to an unidentified investor. Ashkenazy, Germany-based DekaBank and Chicago-based real estate investment trust GGP jointly acquired …
  
  
• February 2017 New York Buildings For Sale
• Buildings For Sale: Forest City Realty Trust is looking to sell its majority stake in a New York retail portfolio to fund manager Madison International Realty. The portfolio encompasses 15 properties and 2.65 million square feet, including 311,000 square feet of retail space at 234 West 42nd Street. MetLife and Beacon Capital Partners are looking to sell the former Goldman Sachs headquarters at 85 Broad Street. The building is a 1.1 million-square-foot building, which is 91% occupied, and valued at up to $700 million. Governor Cuomo wants to sell a 170,000-square-foot building used by the City University of New York …
  
  
• September 2016 New York Buildings For Sale
• Buildings For Sale: Kevin Maloney’s Property Markets Group is looking to sell a newly built and still empty rental tower in Long Island City. PMG built the 45-story, 391-unit tower at 23-01 42nd Road in partnership with Vector Group and toyed with the possibility of turning the units into condominiums, filing a $364.2 million condo plan. Leasing at the tower is set to begin next week, with average asking rents of $62 per square foot. Since the building’s condo plan was approved, a potential buyer could opt to sell the units instead of renting them out. PMG and partner Hakim …
  
  
• February 2016 New York Commercial Real Estate Market Report
• There are more large office blocks available in Midtown now than at any time, and landlords who do not want to watch their spaces linger will have to be creative. More than 80 blocks of 100,000-plus square feet of available space in Midtown has been identified, a 60% increase over the number of spaces available at the peak of 2007. Through the first 11 months of 2015, sovereign wealth funds spent more than $22.6 billion on real estate in the United States, up from about $9.8 billion in 2014. Demand for well-located commercial properties remains high in Manhattan. The hotel …
  
  
• September 2015: New York Buildings For Sale
• NYC Buildings For Sale Unizo Holdings is buying Sherwood Equities and JPMorgan Chase's 370 Lexington Avenue office building for $247 million. 370 Lexington Avenue contains 311,000-square-foot.350 East 86th Street went into contract with Gary Barnett's Extell Development Company for $100 million. Innovo Property group and Artemis Real Estate Partners bought the 15,500-square-foot retail condo at 202 Canal Street for $44 million.Extell just acquired a 14-story office building at 10 West 47th Street for $74.4 million containing 72,000-square-foot building between Fifth and Sixth avenues. Gaia Real Estate is in contract to buy the rental conversion of a former St. Vincent's Midtown …
  
  
• July 2015: New York New Developments
• New York University's campus expansion plans to expand the school by about 2 million square feet in Greenwich Village hasve been approved by Tthe New York State Court of Appeals.s gave an approval to New York University's campus expansion plans to expand the school by about 2 million square feet in Greenwich Village. Neighborhood activists sued to prevent the expansion, claiming it used land that was permanently designated for public park use. The plan will create new high rises on two blocks between West Third and Houston Streets and La Guardia Place and Mercer Street. FAO Schwarz is close to …
  
  
• March 2015: NYC New Developments
• Major Developments Manhattan Borough President and a City Council member have been talking to developers to find a new plan for the historic South Street Seaport site to prevent a 494-foot tower from being built.The city is looking to revamp a program where property owners can transfer unused air rights to others. -The requirements are so difficult that only 10 successful transfers have been made out of almost 1,000 landmarks.. Those transfers took place in Midtown or Lower Manhattan. The NY state's attorney general's office is closing a 36-story, illegal hotel owned by an affiliate group. The property at 49 …
  
  
• September 2014: Manhattan New Developments
• New Developments The city approved Gregg Singer's plan to convert a former Alphabet City public school into a college dormitory. The landmarked building aka P.S. 64 is locateded at 605 East 9th Street. The Department of Buildings approved Singer's plan exam for the conversion.The city's last Office Depot will shut its doors near Times Square at the end of the year. Manhattan building owners keep building even taller buildings. The trick is to bring record height skyscrapers with the minimum of big chunks of useless hidden space. The Bank of America tower at 1111 Avenue of the Americas, which is …
  
  
• September 2013: NYC Buildings For Sale
• NYC Buildings For Sale Developer Centaur Properties has paid $45 million to acquire a West Chelsea site with close to 110,000 square feet of unused air-rights.A developer known for converting old buildings into condominiums has paid $27 million for the former Ridley Department Story on the Lower East Side.Westwood’s company purchased a five-story townhouse for $13.5 million to plant the designer’s New York City flagship. The 12,000 square-foot townhouse at 14 East 55th Street, next to the St. Regis Hotel, will hold the corporate headquarters as well as a Vivienne Westwood retail store and showroom.Northwood Investors paid $150 million for …
  
  
• September 2013: Manhattan New Developments
• Manhattan New Developments Architect Santiago Calatrava has been chosen to design the newGreek Orthodox Archdiocese Church of St. Nicholas at 130 Liberty Street. It will sit just south of the site of the World Trade Center Transportation Hub that the architect also designed..Sheldon Solow clock is running out at his long-dormant, six-acre lot between East 38th and East 41st streets on First Avenue. Mr. Solo could lose his permits and public approvals for a $4 billion project if he does not build a foundation for the office building or one of several apartment towers by this November.The battle to secure …
  
  
• February 2013 New York Commercial Real Estate Market Report
• The aggregate value of the priciest ten Manhattan investment sales for 2012 was $4.8 billion, down from $6.0 billion in 2011, a majority interest sales only. The three office buildings that made the list were RXR Realty’s $720 million acquisition of the 910,473-square-foot 450 Lexington Avenue from Dubai investment fund Istithmar World in September, along with Crown Acquisition’s $390 million purchase of 530 Fifth Avenue in January and Normandy Real Estate Partners’ $360 million purchase of 575 Lexington Avenue in October. Manhattan office leasing experienced a parallel slowdown in activity. The overall volume of deals declined in 2012 by about …
  
  
• November 2012 New York New Developments
• New Developments The Chrysler Building just got a little greener. The Owner has received a LEED gold certification for the 1.2 million-square-foot office tower. Tishman spent two years updating the building’s energy, waste, water and maintenance systems. The upgrades include new plumbing fixtures that will cut the property’s water consumption by 64 percent; a waste-management policy that will ensure 81 percent of the building’s waste is recycled; and a 21 percent reduction in energy usage. The city’s plan to sell of three historic but outdated office buildings in Lower Manhattan, all of which would likely become luxury housing or hotels, …
  
  
• October 2012 New York Buildings For Sale
• NYC Buildings For Sale SL Green Realty is looking to sell its 575,000-square-foot building at 120 West 45th Street, known as Tower 45, for a price of $270 million or more.Morgan Stanley’s Prime Property Fund has put its New York Marriott East Side on the block for $350 million. The hotel has 646 rooms and is located at 525 Lexington Avenue and 49th Street. The 2.3 million-square-foot office tower at 11 Madison Park is hitting the market with a sales price of $1.5 billion. Sapir bought the building in 2003 for $675 million; in 2010 CIM Group purchased a 49 …
  
  
• May 2012 New York New Developments
• New Developments Morgan Stanley just signed a lease for almost 1.2 million square feet of space at Brookfield Office Properties Inc.'s 1 New York Plaza in lower Manhattan. The bank, which currently occupies about 816,000 square feet at the building, will expand by an additional 337,000 square feet. The agreement is the largest office lease for a single building in New York since 2008. Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s push to modernize Midtown East office buildings has become a legacy issue as the mayor’s reign whines to a close. Bloomberg wants to re-zone the area bounded by Third and Fifth avenues and …
  
  
• April 2012 New York New Developments
• New Developments A joint venture partnership including New York Ace Hotel owner and GFI Capital Resources Group Gross’ GB Lodging is set to puchase the Temple Court building, a nine-story city landmark at 5 Beekman Street formerly owned by the Chetrit Group and Bonjour Capital.Mayor Michael Bloomberg signed a bill to declare a formal state of emergency in New York City with regard to housing, allowing him to extend rent regulations for another three year even thought there is a Supreme Court challenge The mayor cited a citywide residential vacancy rate of 3.5 percent. Legally, rent regulations must be terminated …
  
  
• October 2011 New York Buildings For Sale
• New York Buildings sold TIAA-CREF purchased the 280,000-square-foot office building 475 Fifth Avenue from Barclays Capital Real Estate for $144 million or about $514 per square foot. A joint venture of real estate developer Joseph Moinian and Westbrook Capital acquired 475 Fifth Avenue, located at 41st Street, in 2007 for $160 million, but lender Barclays took the property back in 2009 through a deed in lieu of foreclosure.Stonehenge Partners has closed on the 93-unit apartment building at 1143 Second Avenue and 60th Street. Stonehenge paid KFJ Realty $47 million for the six-story building, which includes 15,000 square feet of retail …
  
  
• September 2011 New York New Developments
• Major NYC Developments The London-based Children's Investment Fund inked its first New York City real estate investment this month, providing $250 million in first mortgages for Macklowe Properties' condominium conversion of the luxury apartment building 737 Park Avenue in Lenox Hill. The fund, makes investments in a wide range of industries globally, and gives a portion of its profits to children's charities around the world. "It is the first direct real estate investment we have made in New York," New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman is hindering federal efforts to negotiate a foreclosure settlement with Wall Street banks on …
  
  
• May 2011 New York Buildings For Sale
• New York Buildings sold Joseph Sitt's Thor Equities and developer Joseph Moinian have completed the long awaited deal to buy out Goldman Sachs at 245 Fifth Avenue for $162 million. The property, near 28th Street, had been up for sale since January, when Moinian and his previous venture partner, Goldman Sachs Whitehall Funds, decided to put the building up for sale through Eastdil Secured. The property was originally purchased for $190 million, or $620 a square foot, at the height of the market in 2007.RXR Realty purchased the Starrett-Leigh building at 601 West 26th Street for $900 million from Shorenstein …
  
  
• April 2011 New York Buildings For Sale
• New York Buildings sold Host Hotels & Resorts closed on the $313.5 million sale of the New York Helmsley Hotel, which will be reflagged under the Westin Hotels & Resorts brand in mid-2012 after an extensive renovation. Host Hotels, will renovate the hotel, at 212 East 42nd Street, with a complete overhaul of its 775 guest rooms as well as a meeting space upgrade.Dune Real Estate Partners has agreed to pay $190 million for Anglo Irish Bank's mortgage loan on the embattled Mark Hotel on the Upper East Side. The note, which had a face value of around $300 million, …
  
  
• February 2011 New York New Developments
• New Developments Three years after the Related Cos. began developing its 26-acre Hudson Yards project, the company is now trying to find a tenant willing to commit to occupying at least 600,000 square feet of office space. To land its key tenant, Related is offering either to construct a building and sell it to that company or to provide a big break on the rent. The 12 million-square-foot space, bordered by the High Line and the Hudson River, will run from 10th to 12th avenues and from West 30th to 33rd streets. The $15 billion project is expected to take …
  
  
• September 2010 New York New Developments
• New Developments A deal with Silverstein Properties over how to pay for two towers was approved by the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey. The plan calls for the restoration of the east side of the site to at least street level and the completion of the WTC Transportation Hub. The funding needed for the project is now projected to be between $1.1 billion to $1.3 billion.A crucial City Council subcommittee and committee voted in favor of an office tower at 15 Penn Plaza proposed by developer Vornado Realty Trust. Although opposition to the 1,216-foot-tall tower stemmed from …
  
  
• October 2008 New York New Developments
• New DevelopmentsThe Bush administration proposed granting the Treasury Department the ability to buy up to $700 billion in distressed mortgage-related assets from private firms. The proposal would raise the national debt ceiling to $11.3 trillion. The government also put together a plan that makes investment banks Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley holding companies, giving them access to Federal Reserve Bank of New York funds and putting them under stricter regulations. Boutique firms, like Lazard and Evercore Partners, are seizing clients and staff from fallen rivals. Nationwide, financial companies have announced 103,000 layoffs this year. Democrats proposed taxpayers could receive an …
  
  
• February 2008 New York New Developments
• New DevelopmentsNew York City's office market has gained on the world's two most expensive cities, London and Hong Kong. London vaulted over Hong Kong to become the world's priciest office market with rent for Class A hitting $265 per square foot. The peak rate in New York City's Midtown reached $225 per square foot. The next most expensive U.S. office markets were San Francisco, with a rate of $110 per square foot; Boston, with a rate of $90 per square foot; and Manhattan's Downtown, with a rate of $65 per square foot. Steven Witkoff, Developer, pulled bid to develop Pier …