Lars Remole
Senior research analyst, Colliers
Age: 32
Industry experience: 3 years
Lars Remole provides data and analysis to Colliers brokers on the Fairfield County, Westchester County and Long Island commercial real estate markets, including a 2.6 million-square-foot pipeline of residential conversions in Fairfield County as developers and landlords look for higher and best uses for office buildings. A Darien native, Remole got his first taste of the local development scene as a high schooler, interning at Baywater Properties in the early stages of its redevelopment of the Corbin District mixed-use development in downtown Darien. Remole joined Colliers’ Stamford office in 2022 after working at professional services firm Deloitte in Stamford as a research analyst.
Q: What are the common threads you see in the 2.6 million-square-foot pipeline of office-to-residential conversions in Fairfield County?
A: Location is definitely important, but also: does the building lend itself to reasonable costs for a residential conversion? If the floor plates are massive or super weird, it’s difficult. You want egress, you want windows. Also, was the building mostly vacant, or was it requiring a lot of capital improvements? If you have a building that is struggling and it has a good location and floor plate, those are the top conversions. Now the highest and best use is no longer office space.
Q: How much opposition are conversions receiving from local communities?
A: It’s very dependent upon the municipality itself. Stamford seems to be a little bit onboard. There are some conversions on tap in Darien: the Thorndal Circle office park, where they are going back and forth with the zoning board and they want the design to be a higher standard. That is tricky. Stamford is saying they need more affordable housing. There is some pushback in some communities and zoning boards are saying, “You can’t just slap something together.” A lot of the stuff that is proposed will eventually happen: it’s just the denomination of the units and the aesthetics. You see the same thing with regular multifamily developments.
Q: When will interest rate cuts start to have a significant effect upon transaction activity and pricing in the office market?
A: I don’t think the cuts have done a lot to spur transaction activity in Fairfield County. It’s a piece. In theory, the cuts will help if you’re a struggling landlord. If they’ve been refinancing and the rates have doubled and they have higher vacancy than when they signed the mortgage, now that gives them a little help. But I don’t think we are quite there. There is a lot of capital that is on the sidelines. Interest rates need to drop more before capital markets improve. There might be some distressed sales in the interim. First Stamford Place gave the keys back, so it’s kind of indicative of where the market is.
Q: What are some examples of local building owners getting leasing traction after reinvesting in capital improvements?
A: 200 Elm St. and 396 East Main St. in Stamford put $50 million in capital improvements and upped the amenities. It was already a highly amenitized building, and that building has had a lot of success. Diageo renewed and Indeed signed a new lease, and the occupancy is above 92 percent. Another is 400 Atlantic, which was bought by George Comfort and Sons which put in a full gut renovation. They’ve had a lot of success and it’s a beautiful building.
Q: What are some of the largest blocks of availability in the market, and how are overall tenant requirements trending?
A: Most of them are in the sub-class A buildings [slated for residential conversions]. We don’t remove a building from our availabilities [data] until the conversion has started. Those buildings have started to clear out, but nothing has happened yet, so the owner can change their mind if they get a major tenant. 400 Atlantic in Stamford has a lot of space available, but they are just finishing up construction [on capital improvements] so it’s hard to put someone in. One American Lane in Greenwich is going back to the zoning board [for further review]. There are roughly 25 buildings in Fairfield County that have more than 100,000 square feet of space, and it’s approximately 4 million square feet between
those. These lower tier properties on the outskirts haven’t had the level of capital improvements, and there is not quite as much demand. There are possible candidates for residential conversions, and most of these are for partial demolition and building ground up. But we’ve also seen elevated construction costs and timelines, so that is part of why nothing has happened yet.
Remole’s Top Five Bucket List Trips
- Exploring Japan: Skiing in Hokkaido, getting lost in Tokyo and visiting the tea houses, sushi bars and ramen shops
- Hiking Patagonia and exploring wine country in Chile and Argentina
- Heli-skiing in the Alaska Chugach mountains
- Hike Isle of Skye with a visit to a few of Scotland’s distilleries
- Sail around Mediterranean including Italy, Croatia, Albania and Greece
