Wondering about rents

not in this situation...what we have is an exodus of people from the city because of unemployment which has left both markets in a downward spiral

Agreed with Marco, and I think the situation is compounded by the fact that rental buildings have been slightly overbuilt even when compared to the demand that would have been there had Wall Street kept going like gangbusters, and condos were way overbuilt. So as condos convert to rental in order to cover some of their costs until they can sell, and as people leave the city, you have increasing supply and falling demand, both at the same time.

not only are people leaving the city but people are making less. All the "luxury" apts. that have been built are flooding the market fr at least another year. This is the perfect storm

Post87deflation wrote: "buildings have been slightly overbuilt even when compared to the demand that would have been there had Wall Street kept going like gangbusters..."

Very well said. We're in a situation where there was already an "overshoot"-ing underway (probably by early 2007 in terms of new construction) in the trajectory of supply growth, even if we hadn't had this god-awful downturn.