Lessors of Nonresidential Buildings NAICS 531120

Oct 16, 2025 - Push for Return-to-Office Stalls

• The sluggish return to offices after the pandemic may put downward pressure on demand for office space. Despite many employers’ efforts to curtail remote work, average office attendance is still down compared to pre-pandemic norms, according to The Wall Street Journal. Overall, companies require 12% more time in the office than in early 2024, according to the workplace think tank Work Forward. However, Americans work from home about 25% of the time, unchanged from 2023, according to a Stanford economist who has operated a monthly survey of 10,000 US workers since 2020. Some industry watchers suggest that companies’ priorities have shifted away from in-office enforcement amid other more pressing concerns, including cooling consumer sentiment and unpredictable shifts in US trade policy.
• Mounting real estate foreclosure and repossession activity could impact some building owners in vulnerable regions or market segments. Real estate foreclosure starts and repossessions increased in the third quarter of 2023, according to Attom's Q3 Foreclosure Market Reports. In Q3, US foreclosure starts increased 16% compared to the third quarter of 2024, and repossessions climbed 33% over the same period. Attom's CEO, Rob Barber, said, "In 2025, we've seen a consistent pattern of foreclosure activity trending higher, with both starts and completions posting year-over-year increases for consecutive quarters. While these figures remain within a historically reasonable range, the persistence of this trend could be an early indicator of emerging borrower strain in some areas." States with some of the most foreclosure filings in the third quarter included Florida, Nevada, and South Carolina.

• Arkansas-based department store company Dillard’s, with a partner, recently bought a 47-year-old mall in Longview, Texas, defying a trend of retailers unloading real estate, according to The Wall Street Journal. The move may have been a defensive one, according to a Dillard’s executive. In recent years, investors have snapped up several malls on the cheap as demand has shifted online and to discount and specialty retailers. Some new mall owners have allowed properties to fall into disrepair, and some cities have sued mall owners for not properly maintaining properties while continuing to collect rent. Smaller mall tenants often can relocate if the property isn’t cared for. However, department stores usually own the space they occupy in malls, exposing them to potential bad-faith mall owners.
• About two-thirds of office users plan to increase their square footage over the next three years, according to CBRE’s 2025 Americas Office Occupier Sentiment Survey. One-third of firms surveyed said they plan to reduce their office footprints over the next three years. However, company size tends to dictate the likelihood of expanding or contracting office use. In 2025, 95% of smaller firms planned to increase their office usage, compared to just 85% in 2024. About 60% of companies with 10,000 employees or more said they plan to reduce square footage over the next three years. Industry insiders suggest that firms seeking to reduce expenses are doing so by rightsizing their office occupancy, not by downgrading to lower-quality space.