NPR.

So Adrian back in I guess we call them now the before times I went to an office every single day.

I can vaguely recall doing something like that as well.

In another life. Yes, and I mean you know this Adrian, but the NPR New York offices are just like in the thick of Midtown Manhattan.

It's just one of the areas of New York that's like skyscraper after skyscraper after skyscraper and just super noisy, super crowded,

taxis, tourists, people and suits rushing around talking on their phones.

That has really changed. Midtown is basically you know completely dead.

This is Valerie Campbell. She's a real estate lawyer in New York and she says these days Midtown Manhattan is eerily quiet.

Yeah, right now I'm sitting in you know in a large building on sixth Avenue and there's one other person who's in on my floor.

Everyone else is working remotely. So the building is pretty lonely these days.

At the same time, Valerie's business is booming. Valerie specializes in real estate conversions.

That is turning one kind of property into another kind. And right now all of those empty office towers in New York have developers salivating.

Wanting to convert them into apartments. This is happening all over the US as companies downsize office space.

More people work from home or have hybrid work situations and demand for housing continues to rise.

This is the indicator for plenty of money. I'm Adrian Ma.

And I'm Stacy Bannock Smith today on the show living at the office Adrian. It is not just a bad joke anymore.

It is a thing that is happening how the pandemic and the economic followed from it are changing the landscape of US cities.

Also the rise of the apartment.

A part of a part of what we'll get there. We'll get there.

This message comes from NPR sponsor the American Express business platinum card.

Get the card that's built for business by American Express.

In the last couple of years nearly 15,000 offices across the US have been converted into apartments.

...