Highrise Office to Residential on an NYC Scale

The idea of converting unused and/or older office towers into strata apartments keeps popping up with a variety of supporters, opponents, advocates and naysayers.

Despite that, we like the idea at GoStrata Media since we like to see more and more strata buildings.

So, the conversion of 25 Water Street in New York City’s financial district got our attention.

It’s gone from housing the offices of JP Morgan Chase, the National Enquirer and New York Daily News to a refurbished, stylish and modern 1320 apartment building after the developer added 10 more levels.

Now called SoMA [for South Manhattan], most of the apartments are being leased as long term residences rather than sold as condominiums at rentals from US$4000 per month for a studio to US$10,000 for 3 bedroom apartments [it is New York after all]. And, there are every kind of amenities you could ever want or imagine; wanna play pickleball, basketball or bowling, swim [indoors or outdoors], try sauna or salt rooms, or even virtual reality rooms for sports and more.

It’s not the only recent or upcoming office-to-residential conversion in New York, as there are increasingly vacant office buildings resulting from the coronavirus, remote work, and new business operating models.

You can read the New York Times article A Former Office Tower Goes Big for Residents about SoMA here.

And, you can find out more about SoMA at their website here.