Nearly 30% of San Francisco’s office space is vacant, which is more than seven times the rate before the pandemic hit, and the biggest increase of any major U.S. city.
Small cities in the Midwest topped The Emerging Housing Markets Index in the first quarter, a sign that buyer demand for affordable homes remains robust even as activity in the broader market slows.
U.S. existing-home sales decreased 2.4% in March from the prior month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.44 million. March sales fell 22% from a year earlier and marked the 13th time in the previous 14 months that sales have slowed.
The U.S. office vacancy rate reached a milestone in the first quarter when it rose to 12.9%, exceeding the peak vacancy rate during the 2008 financial crisis, with office-building prices down 25% since early 2022.
In March, 42,368 bankruptcy petitions were filed nationwide, up 33% from 31,898 in February and up 17% from a year ago. Commercial filings jumped 24% to 2,305 in March compared with a year ago, and 548 of those were Chapter 11 bankruptcy filings, up 79% from a year ago.
15% of insurers with commercial real-estate lending businesses are planning to shrink their activity this year. That’s more than three times as many in the same survey last year.
After three consecutive month-over-month increases, the overall number of U.S. rooms in construction fell slightly in March. Among the chain scale segments, luxury shows the highest number of rooms as a percentage of existing supply at 5.2%.
Rockefeller Center is preparing to open its first hotel, the latest sign that Midtown Manhattan’s largest office landlords are leaning into hospitality and entertainment as remote work reduces demand for office space. Aspen Hospitality plans to convert 10 floors of vacant office space above the NBC “Today” show studios into a luxury hotel. Rockefeller Center was a natural choice for Aspen Hospitality, because its owner, the Chicago-based Crown family, co-owns the complex with New York-based real-estate developer Tishman Speyer.