Now we don't need offices. So convert them to apartments to lower housing costs in the short term, and telework means people won't move to cities as much in the long term.

This is actually a good idea...

But the White House initiative will make more than $35 billion available from existing federal programs in the form of grants and low-interest loans to encourage developers to convert offices into residential.

Developers will do this anyway if the offices are empty, why not use that money for a government program to guarantee down payments of first time home buyers?

The developers are doing fine, it's the average American that's struggling, stop funneling money to the people who already have a shit ton of it, trickle down doesn't fucking work

[–] 353247532631@lemmy.world 107 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Agreed. This is a good idea overall, but the implementation smells like a bailout of commercial real estate developers to me.

[–] bobs_monkey@lemm.ee 1 points 1 year ago

Ding dong ding!

But also to a point, it will take a significant amount of work to convert office space to residential. Just utilities alone will be an adventure, and you'd better hope the building was set up with decent truck lines down the core of the structure to begin with. It's not like "hey let's throw up some walls, boom, apartments." You need adequate power distribution, and water/sewer connections to each apartment to fulfill each unit having it's own kitchen and bathroom. Commercial spaces are generally build to accommodate different usage.

[–] ComfortablyGlum@sh.itjust.works 70 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

if the offices are empty, why not use that money for a government program to guarantee down payments of first time home buyers?

The Biden administration is doing that also, it just doesn't make as good a headline.

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2023/10/16/white-house-announces-new-actions-on-homeownership/

[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world 19 points 1 year ago

Always happy to be pleasantly surprised.

Even tho it's half what developers are getting, it's better than nothing.

[–] themeatbridge@lemmy.world 44 points 1 year ago (4 children)

Refitting office space to make it liveable is actually super expensive. Commercial spaces don't have the electric, plumbing, or insulation typically required or expected by residents. It can be cheaper to gut or even tear down the building in order to add the necessary MEP and framing, which is why you see developers are still building new rather than converting old commercial spaces. The money will encourage redevelopment which is far less wasteful and combats sprawl.

That said, I agree with you that you could make the money available to buyers instead of developers, but developers are the ones ~~paying the bribes~~donating to campaigns.

[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world 16 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Then those millionaire (from the examples in the link, billionaire) developers can let their building sit empty...

This is America, where a single cancer diagnosis can bankrupt a family for generations. If we were a civilized country, sure, bail everyone out.

But I don't have sympathy for them when normal people are in such a tight spot.

Like if you're a cardiologist and you're helping someone you saw sprain their ankle, you'd be an idiot to keep helping them when there's five people having heart attacks in the same room.

[–] ArbiterXero@lemmy.world 12 points 1 year ago

The problem is that they are happy to let the building sit empty most of the time

The value of the land and building continue to go up as an investment, even if they aren’t earning money today on the space .

So they don’t actually give a fuck if it sits empty, but society does

[–] themeatbridge@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago

I'm with you, but you're kidding yourself if you think the billionaire is going to suffer. They have leveraged the value with banks, and would skip on down the road with their fortunes while the banks that make mortgage loans have to shore up their books at the expense of common folks. Homebuyers, small businesses, and taxapyers will be expected to cover the losses.

[–] droans@lemmy.world 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

$35B sounds more like it's intended to find a way to make these conversions possible and create a "blueprint" to be used elsewhere.

[–] someguy3@lemmy.world 6 points 1 year ago

These conversions are already possible. It's a big financial decision because you basically have to gut it, but it's not hard work. (No you don't have to demolish the whole building like the other guy says). Each building will be different so you can't make a generic blueprint.

[–] DrPop@lemmy.one 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

There are people developing solutions to this one of which is essentially building panels that house all the equipment and hookups and installing them at location. This is the mobile home industry trying to adapt.

[–] themeatbridge@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

SIP panels aren't going to increase the main stack capacity. Commercial buildings just don't have the capacity for all of the sinks and toilets being used at once. It's a neat idea, and a low voltage lighting system could save a ton of energy, but you still need to gut the building and add critical MEP infrastructure.

[–] DrPop@lemmy.one 1 points 1 year ago

I'm going to choose to agree with you since you seem to know what your talking about. It sounds like what you're saying is they are built differently and it's found to take a lot of work to being them up to mass living condition.

[–] Reverendender@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Can you back up any of the points you are claiming?

[–] JohnDClay@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

See here https://youtu.be/imyPVFFACTk/?t=1m38s

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[–] nogooduser@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago

99 percent invisible did an episode on it recently.

https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/office-space/transcript

[–] themeatbridge@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

I'm mostly speaking from personal experience, so take it with a grain of salt. But there's a lot of developers writing articles based on their experiences.

[–] RedditReject@lemmy.world 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Developers won't do it though. Otherwise, we'd already have this happening. What they do now is call it a loss and get a break on their taxes.

[–] Pat_Riot@lemmy.today 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Developers don't want to touch this. The amount of work it would take to turn an office building into an apartment building is more than you likely realise. Building code for the two are very different so fully gutting the building is first on the list. The amount of plumbing that would have to be added and so on. I'm not saying it's a bad idea. I think it's a great idea, but to get it done you have to make it profitable or the government will have to step up and hire engineers and contractors and operate the building after, which is of course comunism, and so will never happen. Full aside from the political issues, it just makes more sense to knock down the office building and build a whole new one that is actually designed for residential use. Too little too late no matter what happens with the office buildings. It should never have been allowed, from the start, for corporate entities to buy up housing at all. Not apartment buildings, not single family homes. That has to be fixed first.

[–] someguy3@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago

Dude, yes it's a lot of work to gut it, no it doesn't make more sense to knock it down. You gut it. It's not that hard. You basically have a free shell, foundations and parking and all.