Conversions From Office, Retail Mall, To Residential Picking Up

There was an announcement today about a 41,000 square foot office building in San Rafael, California being turned into 41 studio apartments ‘for those formerly unhoused’. The same Bisnow report also mentioned that Tishman Speyer just secured $150 million in financing to turn a Washington D.C. shopping mall into multifamily. They will demolish the 1970’s and now obsolete shopping mall and replace it with a 320-unit apartment development and 90,000 square feet of retail. I believe we will see more and more of  this as owners and lenders try to find value in obsolete office and retail buildings.