Downtown DC is a storefront ghost

[Anonymous]

Most developers can't be bothered with the hassle involved to make a profit on converting commercial to residential.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2024/05/06/can-turning-office-towers-into-apartments-save-downtowns

[Anonymous]

There's a big market for small cheap apartments in downtown DC. Well designed studios with plenty of built-ins of 300 sq feet that rent for $1500/month would be snapped up by tons of biz travelers, Hill interns, WB and IMF staff on short-term contracts, US and diplomatic staff on TDYs, someone who wants a pied-a-terre, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The tax situation in DC is going to become dire. CRE is the foundation of the services we have come to expect.

What services are there really in DC, besides just funding the vagrant-industrial complex? You go to the suburbs and they have tons more actual communities amenities like rec centers, cultural events, workshops, etc.

Are you posting from Nizhny Novgorod?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There's a big market for small cheap apartments in downtown DC. Well designed studios with plenty of built-ins of 300 sq feet that rent for $1500/month would be snapped up by tons of biz travelers, Hill interns, WB and IMF staff on short-term contracts, US and diplomatic staff on TDYs, someone who wants a pied-a-terre, etc.

+1 and they would make easy temp rentals for things like Inauguration and the large scale events in DC that bring in tons of people, of which their are many. The convention center is located downtown and easily walkable or a short metro ride from most of the urban core. Plus with the Caps/Wizards staying in the city, that's another major venue.

There is tons of demand for residences/temp rentals/hotel rooms downtown, but it needs to be exploited. And for everyone who complains that no one wants to live or shop downtown, look at City Center -- it's very high end and very successful. Those restaurants have weeks long waits for tables at times, the cafes are often packed, the high end retail does well, and the Conrad hotel does good businesses with both guests and their eating/drinking venues.

This is really a problem of re-allocating resources, not giving up on the downtown in a major metropolitan area that also continues to boom economically and has a huge number of of wealthy and UMC residents. There is absolutely no reason the downtown can't better serve the existing economy in ways that would benefit everyone (except drug dealers and car jackers). This is a jobs program, too -- construction, hospitality, restaurant service, entertainment. Workers and small businesses would benefit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Out: storefronts and bricks and mortar stores

In: high density urban living and restaurants / eateries

Out: high density urban living where the last pandemic spread like crazy and the next one will too.

In: living exurban or rural on a big piece of property and working from home.

Depends on the city. I’m in Richmond and it’s growing like crazy and retail is at least holding its own. Smaller cities with less traffic and College Towns are doing well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There's a big market for small cheap apartments in downtown DC. Well designed studios with plenty of built-ins of 300 sq feet that rent for $1500/month would be snapped up by tons of biz travelers, Hill interns, WB and IMF staff on short-term contracts, US and diplomatic staff on TDYs, someone who wants a pied-a-terre, etc.

You people crack me up. Experts in everything apparently.

Residential housing is significantly costlier to build and rents for significantly less per square foot.

Using your example, the worst possible apartment in downtown nets 10x less monthly rent than commercial office space, which averages $50 per sq ft.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I've never understood why landlords do this; presumably there is benefit they get from letting these storefronts sit empty than from lowering the rent to at least get something, but I'm not sure what it is (maybe a tax loss thing?). Seems like something the city should take action to combat.

most retail leases are 10 years with options to extend. In higher end buildings sometimes the landlord will do the interior buidlout for specific tenants. It often is better for the space to sit empty, take a write off, than get stuck with a shitty tenant for 10 years. Also, certain types of buildings can only have certain types of higher end retail. eg, a class A office building is not going to have a low rent weed store.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's a big market for small cheap apartments in downtown DC. Well designed studios with plenty of built-ins of 300 sq feet that rent for $1500/month would be snapped up by tons of biz travelers, Hill interns, WB and IMF staff on short-term contracts, US and diplomatic staff on TDYs, someone who wants a pied-a-terre, etc.

You people crack me up. Experts in everything apparently.

Residential housing is significantly costlier to build and rents for significantly less per square foot.

Using your example, the worst possible apartment in downtown nets 10x less monthly rent than commercial office space, which averages $50 per sq ft.

The commercial office RE is not coming back. $50/sq foot is done. I am downtown 5 days/week and so many of the buildings and parking garages are dead empty, except for Wednesdays. If you have a current $$$$ office lease and its only bustling on Wednesday, you are looking to permanently downsize.

Better to rip the band aid off and get the land/structure productive again with housing, hotels, etc. No one wants to work in these giant office buildings. The labor market has spoken.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The tax situation in DC is going to become dire. CRE is the foundation of the services we have come to expect.

What services are there really in DC, besides just funding the vagrant-industrial complex? You go to the suburbs and they have tons more actual communities amenities like rec centers, cultural events, workshops, etc.

Uh, are you under the impression that DC does not have "rec centers, cultural events, workshops, etc.?"

DC offers a free and incredibly high quality Pre-K program, tons of cultural events and festivals, dozens of excellent libraries, rec centers in pretty much every neighborhood in the city, playgrounds and athletic fields, after school programming, summer camps, and tons of low-cost-to-resident programs in everything from tennis and swimming to art and job skills.

Do you... live in DC?

Clearly they don’t. We can WALK to all of those examples listed, all completely free or low-cost (multiple libraries, multiple rec centers, multiple splash pads and pools, multiple parks, multiple playgrounds, two different farmers markets, multiple gyms/classes for adults and kids, and uncountable workshop/event spaces), and all within 20 min in my dc neighborhood. Not to mention the free preschool here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I've said this before but I think DC should also invest in making downtown more of a tourist destination. There are hotels downtown, but they are targeted much more at business/political travelers and not at tourists in town for pleasure. Many tourists who spend their days visiting the monuments and museums wind up staying in Rosslyn or Pentagon/Crystal city and coming in on buses.

DC should create an initiative to attract hotel developers to downtown, with incentives for anyone willing to re-develop existing office space. They should study what it would take to get tourists to stay downtown (I guarantee one need would be greater crime enforcement, but there are probably other things too -- I think some kind of shuttle that ran between downtown hotels and the mall would be a big selling point for families). More tourists will also make it possible to fill in more of the street-level retail, since tourists have to eat and drink and are more inclined to shop than the average office dweller anyway.

There should be federal money for this as well -- it's about bringing tourists into the nation's capitol. Including foreign tourists, there are diplomatic incentives!

This is the way. No matter what happens (e.g., Trump gutting the federal bureaucracy), DC will always have tourism. The mall attracts hundreds of thousands of tourists every weekend, but few venture north of Pennsylvania Ave because Downtown and the Golden Triangle are desolate wastelands outside of office hours (and even then). What the mayor's office needs to figure out is what they could attract there - a few museums or such - that could change this. Once they get that, the rest - hotel conversions, restaurants, bars, and so forth - will follow. Better transportation options are probably the other precondition and probably nothing would work better than the extension of the Streetcar westwards along K St from Union Station.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's a big market for small cheap apartments in downtown DC. Well designed studios with plenty of built-ins of 300 sq feet that rent for $1500/month would be snapped up by tons of biz travelers, Hill interns, WB and IMF staff on short-term contracts, US and diplomatic staff on TDYs, someone who wants a pied-a-terre, etc.

+1 and they would make easy temp rentals for things like Inauguration and the large scale events in DC that bring in tons of people, of which their are many. The convention center is located downtown and easily walkable or a short metro ride from most of the urban core. Plus with the Caps/Wizards staying in the city, that's another major venue.

There is tons of demand for residences/temp rentals/hotel rooms downtown, but it needs to be exploited. And for everyone who complains that no one wants to live or shop downtown, look at City Center -- it's very high end and very successful. Those restaurants have weeks long waits for tables at times, the cafes are often packed, the high end retail does well, and the Conrad hotel does good businesses with both guests and their eating/drinking venues.

This is really a problem of re-allocating resources, not giving up on the downtown in a major metropolitan area that also continues to boom economically and has a huge number of of wealthy and UMC residents. There is absolutely no reason the downtown can't better serve the existing economy in ways that would benefit everyone (except drug dealers and car jackers). This is a jobs program, too -- construction, hospitality, restaurant service, entertainment. Workers and small businesses would benefit.

They'll never attract people to Downtown Washington by using terms that sound like they were invented in the HUD basement in the Sixties: "urban core", "civic core", "corridor." People respond much better to "downtown", "neighborhood" and "avenue"!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just driving down L street and 50% or more of the storefronts are gone?! Holy moly that's bad.

Oh no.... Sounds like the pre Tony Williams days (((( thought they were gone for good (((((

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's a big market for small cheap apartments in downtown DC. Well designed studios with plenty of built-ins of 300 sq feet that rent for $1500/month would be snapped up by tons of biz travelers, Hill interns, WB and IMF staff on short-term contracts, US and diplomatic staff on TDYs, someone who wants a pied-a-terre, etc.

+1 and they would make easy temp rentals for things like Inauguration and the large scale events in DC that bring in tons of people, of which their are many. The convention center is located downtown and easily walkable or a short metro ride from most of the urban core. Plus with the Caps/Wizards staying in the city, that's another major venue.

There is tons of demand for residences/temp rentals/hotel rooms downtown, but it needs to be exploited. And for everyone who complains that no one wants to live or shop downtown, look at City Center -- it's very high end and very successful. Those restaurants have weeks long waits for tables at times, the cafes are often packed, the high end retail does well, and the Conrad hotel does good businesses with both guests and their eating/drinking venues.

This is really a problem of re-allocating resources, not giving up on the downtown in a major metropolitan area that also continues to boom economically and has a huge number of of wealthy and UMC residents. There is absolutely no reason the downtown can't better serve the existing economy in ways that would benefit everyone (except drug dealers and car jackers). This is a jobs program, too -- construction, hospitality, restaurant service, entertainment. Workers and small businesses would benefit.

They'll never attract people to Downtown Washington by using terms that sound like they were invented in the HUD basement in the Sixties: "urban core", "civic core", "corridor." People respond much better to "downtown", "neighborhood" and "avenue"!

Fair. Even their jargon sucks .

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There's a big market for small cheap apartments in downtown DC. Well designed studios with plenty of built-ins of 300 sq feet that rent for $1500/month would be snapped up by tons of biz travelers, Hill interns, WB and IMF staff on short-term contracts, US and diplomatic staff on TDYs, someone who wants a pied-a-terre, etc.

Based on what? How do you know such a "big market" exists?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There's a big market for small cheap apartments in downtown DC. Well designed studios with plenty of built-ins of 300 sq feet that rent for $1500/month would be snapped up by tons of biz travelers, Hill interns, WB and IMF staff on short-term contracts, US and diplomatic staff on TDYs, someone who wants a pied-a-terre, etc.

153 of 166 apartments at the Elle at 20th and L - which is scheduled to open this summer (https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/first-large-scale-office-to-residential-conversion-in-dcs-downtown-nears-completion-302085578.html) - are still available. If these apartments don't rent, I wouldn't bank on too many developers undertaking similar conversions.