Newark Is Turning Old Office Buildings Into Housing, New Study Says

NEWARK, NJ — A national trend of converting “outdated” buildings into housing is starting to take root in Newark, a recent report says.

On Tuesday, real estate website RentCafe.com released its latest Adaptive Reuse Report, which tracks how many new apartments have been converted from buildings such as hotels, offices and factories. See the full study and learn about its methodology here.

Nationwide, adaptive reuse projects have increased by 17.6 percent over the past year, with hotel-to-apartment conversions dominating the landscape for the first time, researchers said.

Newark – which is New Jersey’s most populated city – has been lagging behind other U.S. cities, according to the study:

“In 2023, Newark had various projects in different stages of conversion, yet it delivered no new adaptive reuse apartments. This was in stark contrast to other cities like Richmond, VA, with 622 units delivered; or even unexpected players like Alameda, CA, which opened 372 units in 2023.”

Things have been turning around in the Brick City, however.

Newark is expected to develop 948 apartments through adaptive reuse projects, with 50 percent of these coming from repurposed office buildings, researchers said.

According to the study, ongoing construction efforts in Newark are expected to yield at least 948 units in the coming years, with 495 of those resulting from former office buildings, 208 from hotels, 165 from schools and 80 from a former government building.

At the metro level, Newark is now the third main developer of adaptive reuse apartments, right after Manhattan (with an anticipated 4363 new apartments) and Queens (with 953 new apartments).

Nationwide, real estate developers have been responding to a growing demand for housing following a two-year slowdown, RentCafe.com reported.

This trend is expected to continue in the coming years, researchers said: a whopping 151,000 rental apartments are currently in various stages of conversion across the nation, with 58,000 of those on track to be repurposed from former office spaces.

• See Related: Corporations Own Most Of Newark’s Homes. New Laws Are Pushing Back
• See Related: Newark Sells Homes For $1, Fights Back Against Housing Crisis
• See Related: ‘Affordable’ Isn’t Affordable: Newark’s Plan To Create More Housing

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