Times Square office buildings struggling

Times Square office buildings, which saw tremendous growth before the real estate bust, are now struggling to maintain their clientele as companies flock to take advantage of steep rent discounts in more traditional — and less congested — Midtown locations further east. Besides its crowd control problem, Times Square buildings suffer from the wrong layout for this new real estate era, said David Goldstein, a tenant broker and executive vice president and director at Studley. “The area’s biggest envelopes are raw space, where major build-outs are required. That’s a tough sell these days, with so much prebuilt space on the market at [relatively] low prices,” Goldstein said. Meanwhile, the 1.1 million square feet at speculative office tower 11 Times Square, which is slated for completion early next year, is still tenant-less. It may join the ranks of the former New York Times building at 229 West 43rd Street, whose 767,000 square feet is also currently vacant. [Crain’s]