Dive Brief:
- With Manhattan being perhaps the best example in the U.S. of land as a valuable limited resource, it may not be surprising that the price of unoccupied air rose 47% last year to an average of $305 per square foot.
- Air between how high an existing building is and how high it could be is a quantifiable asset that a developer can buy.
- Air rights cannot be moved all over the borough, but air in the same general area is a transferrable development right that can be attached to a project, perhaps letting the builder create sky-high apartments at higher prices than they would fetch down below.
Dive Insight:
One way that transferring air rights has been beneficial is older, institutional buildings that effectively have untapped value above them. Christ Church, on Park Avenue, sold 70,659 square feet of space above the holy ground for what Tenantwise Inc., a consulting firm, calculated to be $602 each.