Jeremy Moss of Silverstein Properties - 5 Questions

The final piece of Larry Silverstein’s puzzle to rebuild the World Trade Center office campus is almost complete.

Since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center, Silverstein Properties has worked to re-erect One, 3, 4 and 7 World Trade Center, with the final building at 2 World Trade Center set to be completed in 2031.

Progress at 2 World Trade Center is now moving swiftly, as American Express finalized a deal in February to anchor the nearly 2 million-square-foot building for its new global headquarters.

Jeremy Moss, the executive vice president at Silverstein Properties responsible for the company’s office leasing, said AmEx’s deal for the entire 2 World Trade Center building is a reflection of the advantages of Lower Manhattan, for both establishing a headquarters and having access to easy public transportation.

Commercial Observer sat down with Moss last week to discuss the AmEx deal, current trends in Lower Manhattan office leasing, and a rather large chunk of office space coming online at 7 World Trade Center soon.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Commercial Observer: Silverstein started off 2026 strong with a huge lease for AmEx at 2 World Trade Center. What’s next for 2 WTC?

Jeremy Moss: Yes, that’s right. American Express is taking the whole building, all 2 million square feet. The building has really become a custom-designed headquarters building for American Express.

We started construction about 30 days ago. So things are underway, and American Express will move in in 2031.

American Express has been downtown, I think, for well over a century, and this move just reflects their continued commitment to downtown and their recognition of the advantages of this location for their employees. They’re going to be sitting right next to 12 subway lines. It’s Lower Manhattan’s equivalent of 175 Park Avenue or One Vanderbilt.

How would you say office leasing overall is doing in Lower Manhattan? Is there still a lot of demand in the area?

The network of transit that’s here has been a huge driver for Lower Manhattan’s post-9/11 and the World Trade Center’s post-9/11 recovery. Every subway that comes to Manhattan comes to downtown, so you can get here with a single train without having to transfer. And that’s part of the convenience. If you live in New York City and use mass transit, downtown represents the shortest commute for the most number of neighborhoods.

Post 9/11, we saw Lower Manhattan shift from predominantly financial services and law tenants to a whole mix of industries today. We have technology companies, we have professional services companies, we have creative companies. All you need to do is look at the tenant roster at the World Trade Center, and it really tells the story of what’s happened more broadly in Lower Manhattan. And that’s largely a function of Lower Manhattan’s proximity to some of the fastest-growing neighborhoods in New York City, and the ability to access those neighborhoods with the public transportation network that’s here.

It seems like there’s an influx of young working professionals moving within a 30-minute radius of Lower Manhattan. How does this trend directly impact office leasing at WTC and beyond?

It’s a continuation of a trend that started two decades ago, and it’s the reason why the World Trade Center is 95 percent leased. It’s certainly a contributor to American Express’s decision to remain in Lower Manhattan and establish their headquarters here, or rather keep their headquarters here. It’s the reason why we have a lot of headquarters in Lower Manhattan, whether it’s Citibank or Goldman Sachs, but it’s also the reason why Lower Manhattan has become a very popular place to live, not just work.

That has fueled or contributed to the success of all of the residential conversions that have taken some of the older buildings that don’t meet the needs of today’s office tenants and repurpose them as great residential space.

Are there any other office-to-residential conversions in the works for Silverstein following its project at 55 Broad Street?

All I would say is we’re continuing to look at conversion opportunities around the city.

But the result of the conversions in Lower Manhattan is that the remaining office space has become more valuable, and, about 12 months ago, we saw an inflection point where rents have started to increase in Lower Manhattan for both Class A and Class B buildings, and vacancy has started to decrease.

Vacancy was above 20 percent at its height post-pandemic, and now it is in the high teens in Lower Manhattan, and we’ve seen rental rates increase 5 to 10 percent across the whole market. In Lower Manhattan and at the World Trade Center, we’ve seen office rents increase 30 percent since the pandemic.

At the World Trade Center, specifically, the rental rates that we’re achieving are over $100 a square foot, and that reflects the demand for new construction. I think the demand for new office space will continue as older buildings age and become obsolete and people continue to see the benefits of being in a new building.

I think people are choosing to be in new construction because it delivers huge benefits to the occupants. It’s getting people excited about coming back to work, because they’re able to have an experience that they wouldn’t necessarily have working at home, and the spaces that we’re building are much more reflective of how companies want to function.

It’s often difficult to accomplish that in an old building. I mean, we’re seeing that in the ceiling heights and the column spacing, the elevators, the air conditioning systems. New buildings are designed in a way to support more collaborative spaces, more monetized spaces, and that, in turn, supports building corporate culture and allowing people to interact in different ways and work in different ways.

What else is in the works at the World Trade Center campus?

We will have a block of space coming available at 7 World Trade Center, which will be an incredible opportunity for companies that want to be in new construction. There is a very limited amount of space in newly constructed buildings, and, for that reason, we already have the amount of space we are going to have available. We have, I would say, two times to three times that amount of interest. 

We already have people looking at the space, and it’s not available for 18 months. It’s about 700,000 square feet, previously home to Moody’s.

Today you have 50,000 people working in Lower Manhattan, and it’s remarkable how far we’ve come since 9/11, and I think that’s a testament to the commitment that Larry Silverstein made to rebuild the World Trade Center, and the commitment that many, many people have made to help rebuild Lower Manhattan.