Office-to-apartment conversions in US cities keep rising, but many remain incomplete
With office vacancies still hovering around 30-year highs, and finding a good apartment deal in America’s most popular cities remaining a near-mythical pursuit for many, property developers have found an obvious, if not-particularly-cozy, solution: turning empty corporate hubs into blocks of private homes.
The number of office-to-apartment conversions currently in progress across the US increased to 70,700 in January. That’s up 28% from the same period last year and ~3x the number recorded for 2022, data analysis from RentCafe reported by Axios has found.
Still, the task of renovating workplaces into homes is no small feat. Even as thousands of new conversions are still being proposed to cities, developers have actually completed less than 7% of office-to-apartment units that were under construction in 2024. But, with the pandemic-era trend of working from home still persisting even amidst a flurry of return-to-office orders, America’s demand for homes appears stronger than its demand for office space.
