Posted on 07/18/2023 4:04:36 AM PDT by george76
As commercial and residential vacancy rates continue to reach all-time highs in San Francisco, many big tech buildings have been left abandoned.
One of the largest offices there comes from Google, which owns a whopping 1.4-million-square-foot building that has remained on the market for sublease.
Other big tech companies, like Meta and Roku, have also put up space for sale.
Back in March, Intel even listed its 505,000-square-foot office.
“As a hybrid-first company, we are continuing to assess and optimize our space utilization to create more vibrant workspaces for our employees when they are on-site, while also achieving cost reductions,” Addy Burr, with Intel Corporation Communication, previously told The Post in a statement.
But no one is rushing to buy.
“Big companies are dumping space on the market with almost no takers,” Craig Petersen from Kidder Mathews told the Real Deal. “We are seeing more activity in the small office markets.”
Additionally, in a recent second-quarter report by Savills, Silicon Valley’s office availability saw an acute increase due to considerable givebacks by large tech companies.
“With the entire technology sector in a correction, office availability in Silicon Valley is at an all-time high and is expected to increase even further as return to office rates have lagged the rest of the country despite high-profile corporate announcements,
...
since last year, leasing activity has gone down even more — by 52%.
...
Meanwhile, companies are not only attempting to get rid of space, but they have also halted major construction projects that would have reshaped Silicon Valley.
Google, for example, has stopped its Downtown West project in San Jose.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
I wonder how much longer they can prop up the CRE market.
It should crash, and propagate through tons of banks.
The buildings are configured for office space. I doubt they can be reconfigured for residential use.
Lol, yes. Oh the irony…
I might move to Central America. They’re all here now.
I love tropical weather.
“As a hybrid-first company, we are continuing to assess and optimize our space utilization to create more vibrant workspaces for our employees when they are on-site, while also achieving cost reductions,”
—
In what world does someone speak like this?
Translation - we rearranged the deck chairs on the Titanic and hope we don’t die when it sinks.
This is a direct result of bad Democrat policies. While they may still collect property tax on the building, they have lost the sales tax that was generated by the people who once occupied those buildings.
Socialist do not understand economics and you can not be a socialist if you do understand economics.
Businesses will leave, residents will leave, the city will collapse, the bums will leave. Then the savvy will move back into a cleaned-out city.
Depends, what is the infrastructure capacity laid down when developers erected office towers?
Can the surrounding water and power supply, plus the sewage infrastructure, handle people living in the towers 24/7 versus showing up for 8 hours per day, making coffee, and using the bathroom to wash your hands++.
Dunno the answer
bro, who says anything about converting the space? They’ll be happy just filling the place with migrant crackhead zombie armies
Yes, the coming CRE crash and banking crisis will ripple through the entire economy, too. How bad will it get for us?
I’m thinking very bad and likely global in scope.
To be honest I expected it to already happen, so what do I know?…
If it’s bad and global, time for WWIII?
Judge Dread
Bingo! What y'all are missing is that the equity value in these buildings is collateral for some huge loans. As they default, it could ripple through the banking sector and maybe bring down a few more, which in turn bring down a few more, and you have 1929 all over again. No amount of money-printing will stop it.
This time feels very different with the collapse of CRE prices and no visible way back to where we were. It seems that people don’t want to go to an office more than two, maybe three, days per week. Companies have been trying to force people back to the office and failed.
Plus, this crisis is brewing in the worlds biggest economy, not a small nation like Thailand (70 million people, 27th largest GDP).
The worst is yet to come. All it takes is one Too Big to Fail Bank to topple.
the kind of people they will put into those buildings ain’t gonna differentiate between the CEO executive suite and the supply room.
It’s going to be an urban hellscape
All. E cause of the insane government over-reaction to COVID, too. We printed and showered $5 trillion across the land to deal with people staying home during COVID. Now the feds will have to print a lot more than that to prop up the banks suffering CRE losses from assets worth 40% (far less?) of their previous value.
If the feds can stop the contagion and prevent depression, expect massive inflation.
Got to get to the bottom before the buyers return......
Was just thinking the same. The homeless will take good care of the buildings lol
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