545 West 25th Street, 139 Centre Street and 50 West 57th Street

The decision to rent or to buy isn’t one that only affects home-seekers. It’s also a dilemma that businesses face. And increasingly, New York businesses want to buy their office space, which has bumped up the demand for office condominiums. According to the New York Times, much of the shift is due to cultural preferences. While many American businesses in the city prefer to lease office space to accommodate future growth, changing market conditions and other factors, foreign businesses favor purchases. Margarette Lee, a principal at New York-based developer Youngwoo & Associates, whose founder hails from Korea, said that the Asian businesses, in particular, covet office condos. [more]

Source: Time Equities

The dollar volume of office condominium sales in Manhattan slipped by nearly a third last year to its lowest level since 2005, a report released today by condo developer Time Equities shows.

The value of condos sold fell to $158 million in 2009, the weakest year since 2005 when just $49 million sold, the report, which covers 2009 sales data, shows. The volume in 2008 was $233 million.

The total amount of square feet sold fell by 42 percent to barely 220,000 last year from over 379,000 in 2008. As of the end of 2009, there were 8.2 million square feet of commercial condos in 76 buildings, Time Equities data show.

The report’s author Michael Rudder, director of sales and leasing for Time Equities, said the decline was representative of the broader sales market.
The drop, however, was not as steep as the overall 72 percent fall in Manhattan building sales volume last year as reported last month by commercial sales firm Massey Knakal Realty Services. [more]