AI might one day wreak havoc on commercial real estate, as some fear. But at least right now, it’s only adding fire to the superheated Manhattan market.

The fear is that AI will lead to large employee layoffs, which of course would mean companies would need less office space — a real estate “apocalypse.”

But when Harvey AI, an AI provider to law and other professional firms, doubled its space at One Madison in March, SL Green Green chairman/CEO Marc Holliday called such ongoing expansions “the ultimate response to the false narrative that AI is shrinking the workforce in New York City.”

Last week’s news substantiated his optimism. In a dramatic display of AI’s growing real estate clout, Durst and the Port Authority announced that legal and compliance company Norm AI took most of the top floors of 1 World Trade Center, bringing the tower to 97% leased.

Meanwhile, much-in-the-news, San Francisco-based Anthropic — creator of controversial chatbot Claude — is close to a deal to lease AEW Capital Management’s entire, 365,000 square-foot 330 Hudson St., the Commercial Observer reported. Anthropic currently has a mere 15,500 square feet in the city.
Sure doesn’t sound like an apocalypse, does it?