7 Investigates: Boston approves converting offices to apartments to revitalize downtown – Boston News, Weather, Sports [Video]

BOSTON (WHDH) – Buildings are begging for business in downtown Boston.

‘Office space for rent’ signs are displayed on almost every street. The signs revealing the daunting reality that one in three buildings in the city are vacant.

Longtime residents say the streets aren’t much better.

“There use to be a lot of people. It use to look like New York, like you’d be walking and you’d be like ‘Oh, my god,’” Luis Ayala remembered.

Both are lingering effects of an increase in work-from-home policies and rent prices.

“It’s not affordable, nobody can live here,” Boston resident Jose Menjvar said.

A dwindling supply of units in downtown leaves high demand and prices for the apartments remaining. It was a problem city officials spotted even before the pandemic exacerbated it.

To combat the uptick in office vacancies and decrease in available apartments, the Boston Planning and Development Agency (BPDA) launched the Downtown Residential Conversion Incentive Pilot Program in 2023. …