NYC Market Update: Manhattan’s Office Pipeline Shrinks

As of May, just under 19.3 million square feet of office space was under construction in Manhattan, according to CommercialEdge data.

The borough’s pipeline decreased month-over-month for the first time since the beginning of the year, registering a 1.6 percent dip. The bulk of Manhattan’s office projects was clustered around Hudson Yards, Chelsea and Hell’s Kitchen on the Far West Side.

With 3.1 million square feet underway, Brooklyn’s under construction pipeline has been steadily increasing since January, when a total of 2.7 million square feet were underway. Even though May figures matched April’s findings, the borough still had the second largest pipeline on a percent-of-stock basis in the country, second only to Austin.

Under construction projects represented 8 percent of stock, a figure that expanded to 14.4 percent when adding planned supply—easily surpassing the national average of 2.4 and 5.9 percent, respectively. Situated in downtown Brooklyn, the 500,000-square-foot 1 Willoughby Square was the borough’s largest office building underway in May. Since then, JEMP Realty’s 34-story, 495-foot high-rise came online in mid-June, becoming the borough’s tallest high-rise.

Bronx, Queens pipeline close to delivery

As for the remaining boroughs, the supply pipeline is slowly shrinking as well, with no notable groundbreakings so far this year. In the Bronx, five office properties totaling roughly 428,000 square feet were underway by the end of May, all of which scheduled for delivery in the coming months. In Queens, five projects spanning some 667,000 square feet were under construction, with four of them planned for completion in June and July this year.

Innolabs, a six-story, 267,000-square-foot life science facility is the largest office development rising in Queens. King Street Properties and GFP Real Estate are behind the Perkins+Will-designed renovation and expansion project, situated at 45-18 Court Square in Long Island City, N.Y. The building represents the New York City Economic Development Corp.’s first investment within the $500 million LifeSci NYC program. Following its groundbreaking in late 2019, the project was regarded as “essential” when most construction sites paused during the first months of the pandemic.

CommercialEdge covers 8M+ property records in the United States. View the latest CommercialEdge national monthly office report here.