The Real Deal New York

From the May issue: Brokers famously sell the mantra of location, location, location. But when it comes to their own offices, that refrain may be changing. During the boom times, real estate companies large and small rushed to open glittering storefront offices, like Halstead Property’s mammoth 408 Columbus Avenue office across from the Museum of Natural History, or the Tribeca office that Brown Harris Stevens has on the ground floor of a 19th-century Romanesque Revival building. The hope was to stake out their turf in prime neighborhoods while attracting passersby. But New York’s housing slump has prompted the rapid closing of some real estate offices, as firms seek to cut costs, and the opening of others, as they seek to take advantage of falling rents to gobble up new territory. And while closing an office inevitably means ceding territory to competitors, with real estate sales down nearly 50 percent from last year according to a quarterly market report by Prudential Douglas Elliman, satellite offices are a luxury many firms can no longer afford.
Storefront Shakeup