Life insurance is committed to recycling empty offices into housing

True chestnut tree, this "recycling" was one of the flagship measures of the Elan law of 2018 in order to respond to the housing shortage, particularly in Ile-de-France where land is scarce and expensive.

This issue has come back to the fore in recent months with the spread of teleworking which has prompted many companies to think about the post-epidemic and rethink the size of their offices.

In the Paris region, the number of rented offices fell by almost half (-45%) compared to a year earlier.

"There is an alignment of the planets" favorable to an acceleration of the recycling of empty offices in housing, estimated Joachim Azan, the founding president of Novaxia, during a press conference in Paris.

This acceleration will be materialized by the launch in the spring of a specific fund "Novaxia R", supported by Suravenir, Spirica, AG2R la Mondiale and Generali, he added.

"We aim to deploy one billion euros in investments, the equivalent of 250.000 m² of floor space or the equivalent of 4.000 housing units" for "the next three years," said Joachim Azan.

The objective of this fund, which will offer savers the opportunity to diversify their savings into housing, is "to buy office buildings at a discount of around 20 to 30%" and "to manufacture housing at the resulting from this transformation ". Its promoters expect a return of 5% per year.

Ile-de-France - which has, according to Novaxia, three million m² of empty offices to which are added between "3 to 6 million m² due to telework" increased since the health crisis - will be mainly concerned.

A first charter was signed in March 2018 by ten operators who had committed to transforming 500.000 m² of offices into housing in Ile-de-France by 2022.

But almost three years later, no results have been released.

There is for the moment no "consolidated figure", confirmed Tuesday the Minister of Housing Emmanuelle Wargon, but "it worked, there are plenty of projects in progress".

The minister, who was visiting offices transformed by Novaxia into housing in the 20th arrondissement of Paris, said that she would bring together "a fortnight" the actors of 2018 to take stock.