Bouwinvest and Tishman Speyer Bet on a Chrysler Building Revival

What happened

Dutch investment manager Bouwinvest and developer Tishman Speyer have teamed up to buy U.S. office buildings, starting with the Chrysler Building in Manhattan. Bisnow New York reported the story on 11/06/2026.

The two firms set up a separately managed account to find and buy prime office buildings with room for improvement in key U.S. cities. Their first deal was the purchase of a 150-year ground lease on the Chrysler Building. The deal was done with a group of investors led by Canada's Public Sector Pension Investment Board. It includes $235M to renovate the building, plus ground lease payments to Cooper Union.

The 77-story tower is less than 50% occupied. Tishman Speyer plans to upgrade three-quarters of the vacant or soon-to-be-vacant space into move-in-ready suites. It also plans to turn the 61st floor into an indoor-outdoor amenity space, convert the underground arcade into fitness, wellness and meeting space, and clean and restore the facade and crown. Mechanical, electrical and air systems will be updated and the cooling towers optimized to improve energy efficiency.

Robert Wagenaar, director of North American investments at Bouwinvest, said the target return should be above 10%. He called bringing the building from its current vacancy to fully let "the biggest bet" and said doing renovations with tenants in place is a risk. The partnership plans to buy four to eight assets, depending on how fast the office market recovers.