Jeff Bezos’ Amazon office to move to New York’s Queens district: will renters have to pay more?
Property and rental prices in the area are tipped to rise if the e-commerce company opens a new central base in the city for up to 50,000 employees
The sales team at Queens brokerage Modern Spaces met on Tuesday to discuss how to price the penthouses on the top of the New York borough’s tallest condominium building, Skyline Tower, in Long Island City.
Naturally, their planning session took into account the big news: Amazon, the e-commerce and cloud computing company led by CEO Jeff Bezos – the world’s richest person – was close to a deal for a new central office in the neighbourhood.
“We were thinking of creating a really nice, full-floor apartment for Jeff,” Eric Benaim, president of the brokerage, said. “We’d have a built-in [digital voice assistant, Amazon] Alexa.”
Long Island City, a fast-growing area just across the East River from Manhattan, is one of two locations that together would house as many as 50,000 Amazon staff in its ever-expanding workforce, according to people briefed on the negotiations.
The news has left local real estate brokers starry-eyed with possibility, and even the most sober data-watchers are calling for a range of optimistic scenarios for the Queens sales and rental markets.
Many blocks of flats have been built in the neighbourhood in recent years, creating an overabundance of glassy towers that have depressed rents and forced landlords to offer incentives to entice tenants. The for-sale market has fared better, with prices climbing sharply as buyers seek out the area as an affordable option with just a short commute to Manhattan.
Queens sale prices have hit records for six consecutive quarters, with the average house price reaching US$635,281 in the three months to September 30, property valuer Miller Samuel and brokerage Douglas Elliman Real Estate said.
If you’re marketing a condominium right now, this is like manna from God