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The COVID-19/Delta variant pandemic dealt a heavy blow to the office commercial real estate market by way of its impact on employment and with more workers performing their tasks remotely. With nearly half a million office-using jobs lost and with more workers working from home compared to pre-pandemic level, occupancy has fallen by 127 million square feet since the second quarter of 2020 through October 2021. On the other hand, there are 1 million more occupied apartment units since the second quarter of 2020 as of October 2021.
Upon the recommendation of the Real Estate Research Advisory Board under Chair Dawn Aspaas (SD) and Vice-Chair Beth Cristina (LA), NAR Research Group undertook an analysis of how vacant office buildings are being converted into housing.
The first component of the research is an analysis of office-to-housing conversions in 27 markets with the largest decline in occupancy since the pandemic. In the second component of the study, NAR Research analyzed the market conditions and the factors that led to the success of eight office-to-housing conversions in Maryland, Washington DC, New York, California, and Illinois.