Signs of Slowing in the City That Never Sleeps

The graphic below is cobbled together from two indicators I like to follow and an article published today in Business Insider. On the left is the JLL office clock. It shows New York as entering the "falling phase" in terms of rents. The middle graphic is from the Business Insider article stating that NYC luxury real estate had its slowest month in six years. On the right are the AIA Architectural Billing Index results from last month (click here for my explainer). 

These pieces of evidence are not entirely related. The JLL clock is for commercial properties. The BI article is for multi-family properties and the Northeast ABI and Multi-family Residential ABI numbers include data that extends beyond NYC. However, if you combine them and include the recent data that reveals that New York City had a decline of commercial construction starts (which includes both commercial and multi-family projects) of 8% over the fist half of 2019 and the signs point to an almost unmistakable slowdown in NYC construction activity.