Downtown Overview 2022: What the Post-Pandemic Numbers Have to Say

The Downtown Alliance's latest "Lower Manhattan Real Estate Year in Review" offers a mixed picture of the area's recovery from the impact of Covid-19. Photo: Joe Woolhead

Slow and steady. That’s how the Downtown Alliance views the pandemic recovery of Lower Manhattan (Murray Street and below) in 2022. The Alliance’s annual year-in-review report [1], which tracks a variety of Downtown real estate-related data, shows some growth in store openings, and more office leasing activity than Midtown but, with the new normal of remote and hybrid worklife, both are still well below pre-pandemic levels. To no one’s surprise, the residential market was as hot as ever. In fact, the report notes, “Median rents broke multiple highs throughout the year.”

“A year that began under the cloud of last winter’s Omicron wave ended with some positive signs,” Alliance president Jessica Lappin said in a statement, noting the return of foot traffic, tourists and some new retail establishments.

Here’s what the report shows, by the numbers.

OFFICE LEASING: Far Below Pre-Pandemic Levels

• The 2022 office vacancy rate was 22.7%, a year when for-rent office space reached record highs across Manhattan.

• The highest levels of vacancies (above 30%) are roughly in two areas: west of Broadway and south of Liberty Street; and east of Broadway and north of Maiden Lane. 

• The largest blocks of empty office space was mostly on Water Street. Entirely empty office buildings include 60 Wall Street, 111 Wall Street and 175 Water Street.

• Office renting was up 12% from 2021 and 38% above the record low in 2020, but 29% below the 5-year annual average.

• In the 4th quarter of 2022, there was a steep decline in Manhattan office leasing—44% in Midtown, 38% in Midtown South—while Downtown’s numbers dropped 8%. 

• Asking rents, averaging $55.87 per square foot, are at their lowest since 2014.

• The average free-rent period increased to 18 months, from 12 months at the end of 2019.

RETAIL: Mostly Food and Drink Openings; Storefronts Difficult to Rent

• 154 stores opened in 2022 vs. 93 in 2021 and 105 in 2019. Nearly two-thirds of those businesses were food-and-drink related.

• 160 retailers closed permanently, twice as many as the year before. 46% were restaurant/bars, 34% shops and 20% personal/business services.

• Asking rents for retail spaces between Battery Place and Chambers Street ranged from $235 to $600 per square foot, down 28.4% from 2021.

• Average rents along Broadway fell to their lowest since Spring 2015.

• The Alliance highlights three “key retailers” that are expected to open this year: Pretemps, a French department store at One Wall Street; Sixpoint Brewery, a 7,500-square-foot tap room that incudes an outdoor beer garden at 200 Liberty Street in Brookfield Place; and CompletePlayground, a 40,000-square-foot children’s activity center at 30 Broad Street.

RESIDENTIAL: Record High Rents

• There are currently 34,243 apartment units located in 343 residential buildings. 

• One residential building, 7 Day Street, opened in 2022 with a total of 775 units. Construction on the coversion of the landmark One Wall Street into 566 condominiums is expected to be completed early this year.

• Rents hit a record high, with the median rent of $4,634, 16% above pre-pandemic levels.

• The median sales price of co-ops and condos reached $2,075,000, also a record high.

HOTELS AND TOURISM: On the Rebound

• 2022 was the first year since the pandemic that no hotels closed.

• Of the 10 hotels that closed since 2020, two reopened and two have been converted to residential use. Another five—two of them last year—have new owners and new names.

• One hotel is still closed, the 33-room Down Town Association at 60 Pine St.

• By the end of 2022, hotels in the Alliance’s Lower Manhattan district had 940 more rooms than at the beginning of the pandemic.

• The area’s 42 hotels contained 8,886 rooms.

• Seven more hotels with a total of 1,411 rooms are planned.

• 79% was the monthly occupancy-rate peak for the year, 9% below pre-pandemic levels.

• The average daily room rate was $324, 15% above 2019 levels.

• Compared to 2021, there was a higher share of buyers for 2- and 3-bedroom apartments (7% and 9% respectively) and fewer (9%) for studios and 1-bedroom units.

FOOT TRAFFIC AND OTHER PEOPLE NUMBERS: Big Jump Over 2021

• Foot traffic rose from 2.7 million people in January, 2022, a record low due to the Omicron variant, to 4.7 million in April and a peak of 5.2 million in September; 4.8 million people walked Downtown streets during the holiday season.

• More than 14.6 million riders went through the Fulton Street subway station, Downtown’s busiest, a 20% increase over 2021 levels. In March alone the number reached nearly 1 million, the most for a single month since 2020.

• 1.9 million ferry riders went through the Wall Street/Pier 11 terminal, 55% more than in 2021 and the highest since the pandemic.