Why Choose Manhattan?

Manhattan is one of the world's most desirable business locations. Just hearing the name brings to mind images of prestige, dynamism, and innovation, and once you are here you will have the feeling that this is where things happen.

This densely populated New York City borough is home to world-class museums, impressive architecture, a thriving entrepreneurial ecosystem, and a vibrant atmosphere that reminds you that this city never sleeps. Manhattan is the heart of New York City, but if you are looking for a break from city life, a short ferry ride can get you to Staten Island, or you can unwind at the nearby beaches in Long Island.

This vibrancy also extends to the area's diverse business environment. Large corporates in banking, finance, and legal have made Lower Manhattan their home, whereas the Midtown area is popular with retailers, media, and entertainment firms. Silicon Alley (the area around the Flatiron Building) is the place to be for ambitious startups and creative firms.

Some of the world's most influential financial corporations are headquartered here, including JP Morgan, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley; real estate firms like Douglas Elliman, Corcoran Group, Engel & Volkers; and media and communications giants like Verizon, Time Warner, Twentieth Century Fox, and Bloomberg.

Moreover, established tech companies like Google and Facebook have recently opened satellite offices in the area. Other important tech firms in Manhattan include LinkedIn, IBM North America, Spotify, and Square.

Office Space in Manhattan

Manhattan is one of the biggest office markets in the United States, with office inventory amounting to more than 500 million square feet. Typical tenants are those involved in FIRE (finance, insurance and real estate) and TAMI (technology, advertising, media and information).

Manhattan Commercial Office Space - Inventory: Approximately 235 million square feet - or nearly half - of the office space located in Manhattan is space in Midtown (which includes such well known neighborhoods as Times Square, Theater District, Murray Hill and Madison Square), a further 170 million in Midtown South (Penn Plaza, Empire State Building, Bryant Park), and the remainder in Downtown / Lower Manhattan (Greenwich Village, Lower East Side, FiDi). Another thing to note is that 80 percent of all conventional offices are between 5,000 and 15,000 square feet, so larger or smaller units are not easy to come by unless you're looking for sub-leasing or flexible office rentals.

Manhattan Commercial Space - Plenty of Options: Manhattan is a highly competitive office market whose performance is mostly unaffected by economic ups and downs. As one of the most coveted office locations in the world, the area offers a great variety of office accommodation options, from conventional space in landmark buildings dating from the 1930s or earlier, to fully furnished and wired serviced offices, or the nearly 8 million square feet of coworking and flexible spaces available.

Midtown Office Space - Prestigious Properties: The most prominent buildings with office space available for rent or lease in Manhattan are the Empire State Building, Chrysler Building, and 30 Rockefeller Plaza. Other notable office towers include One Chase Manhattan Plaza, the Lipstick Building, 4 Times Square, General Motors Building, America's Tower, The New York Times Building, 4 World Trade Center, and 1 Battery Park.

Manhattan Office Space Rental - Cost: Average office rents have been growing since 2010 and are back to pre-recession levels. In late 2017, asking rents averaged $75 / sq ft for all office types including private and shared office suites, with an average free rent allowance of 10 months and average tenant improvement allowance at over $70. Class A space for rent is most expensive in the Midtown South area (specifically in Hudson Square, Greenwich Village, and SoHo), and lowest in downtown districts like World Trade Center, Insurance District, and City Hall.

Manhattan Commercial Real Estate: Office Market Outlook

Looking ahead, there is a clear shift westwards. The majority of new developments are clustered around the western side of Manhattan (think 5th Ave, West Village, Chelsea and TriBeCa), the chosen relocation area for more than half of the city's Fortune 500 companies. In particular, Hudson Yards is set to be one of the largest office developments of its kind in the United States, having the potential to accommodate 26 million square feet of office space.

On the whole, the redevelopment of West Manhattan will add more than 6 million square feet of office space to the area. The project is marketed to corporates, media, tech, and legal firms, and some already confirmed tenants include Ernst & Young, Amazon, Accenture, McKool Smith, and JP Morgan.

Other future trends worth noting include the growth in square footage used by coworking spaces, and the expansion of sub-markets in Roosevelt Island and Hunters Point South.