In May 2024, the Real Estate Board of New York (REBNY) released its latest monthly analysis based on Placer.ai location data. The report covers 350 Manhattan office buildings and tracks mobile data of office tenants, employees, and visitors, as well as retail customers within these buildings.
According to the report, Manhattan office buildings had an average visitation rate at 74% of pre-pandemic levels in May. This marks a year-over-year increase of 4 percentage points compared to May 2023. Despite a slight decrease from April’s rate of 75%, this can be attributed to Memorial Day holiday travel. Excluding this period, there was actually an improvement in visitation rates from April.
Class A+ properties had the highest average visitation rate at 86%, followed by Class B/C with a rate of72% and Class A/A- with a rateof69%. Across submarkets (Midtown,Midtown South,Downtown), there was generally stable growth compared to April with each showing an increaseofat least3%fromthe previous year.
Keith DeCoster,directorofMarketDataandPolicyat REBNY,stated that “TheManhattanofficemarkethasseensustainedyear-over-yearvisitationgrowththroughthefirstfivemonthsof2024.”
This highlights that despite challenges faced during the pandemic,theoffice marketinManhattaniscontinuingto show signs offuture recovery.Thevisitationsratesare steadilyincreasing,andthis trend is expectedto continueinthe coming months.
