Office Space for Lease in Murray Hill

Murray Hill sits just below and east of Grand Central, a pocket of brownstones, walk-ups, and prewar office buildings that stayed quiet while the rest of Midtown got louder and more expensive. The Empire State Building marks one corner; the East River is a few blocks the other way. What you get here is a Midtown address minutes from Grand Central, priced well below most of the district.

Asking rents average about $72.14/SF across the submarket (Avison Young, Q1 2026), below Midtown’s $78.23/SF and a fair bit under the $85.28/SF that Class A commands district-wide (Cushman & Wakefield, April 2026). That average is misleading on its own, since the Class A towers on Park Avenue pull it up. The prewar buildings on Madison and the side streets toward the river run closer to $45 to $65 (Metro Manhattan internal research, May 2026).

Murray Hill also has the most available space of any major Midtown submarket, around 22.4% (Avison Young, Q1 2026). With the rest of Midtown tight, that extra room works in a tenant’s favor: more to choose from, and landlords with a reason to deal. To see what’s open right now, browse Murray Hill office space.

Murray Hill Office Market Overview

Murray Hill has long been Midtown‘s affordable corner. It kept the prewar buildings and the residential quiet that most of the district traded away, and its rents never climbed the way they did around Grand Central or over toward Fifth Avenue. For a tenant, that adds up to a Midtown address next to the city’s busiest transit hub, at a discount to nearly everything around it.

The wider market is working in your favor, too. Manhattan tenants leased 11.78 million SF in the first quarter of 2026, the busiest first quarter since 2014, and availability fell to 13.7%, down for the eighth quarter running (Colliers, Q1 2026). Midtown asking rents reached $78.23/SF overall and $85.28/SF for Class A (Cushman & Wakefield, April 2026), and CBRE’s May reading had the Midtown average at $84.77/SF and still rising (CBRE, May 2026). Murray Hill belongs to that same tightening market, but its rents haven’t caught up. That lag is what makes it worth a look.

Four Forces to Monitor

• High availability gives tenants the upper hand. At about 22.4%, Murray Hill has more space on the market than any other major Midtown submarket (Avison Young, Q1 2026), even with the rest of the district tightening. Most of it is in the older Madison Avenue and side-street buildings rather than the Park Avenue towers. For a tenant, that means more options and more room to negotiate, on rent, free months, and the build-out allowance alike.
• Demand is spilling over from Midtown South. The markets just south, Midtown South neighborhoods like Flatiron, NoMad, and Chelsea, are running low on the loft space tenants want, and some of that demand is moving north into Murray Hill for a cheaper address that’s still close by. It’s a gradual shift, but it’s starting to absorb value space that used to sit empty. Our NYC office market outlook for 2026 flags it as one to watch.
• The Park Avenue buildings are being upgraded. Owners have been spending on the Class A stock: Vornado put a reported $395 million into One Park Avenue, Pelli Clarke Pelli redesigned 3 Park Avenue in a $30 million renovation, Haddad Brands bought 2 Park Avenue in 2024, and 180 and 183 Madison were both renovated to LEED standards. None of it is cheap, but it’s lifting the quality, and the ceiling, at the top of the submarket.
• Healthcare anchors the neighborhood. NYU Langone leases roughly 67% of One Park Avenue on a term running to 2050 (Vornado, 2021), and its outpatient, orthopedic, and cancer centers occupy much of the side streets toward its Kips Bay campus. For a medical or dental practice, a lab, or any medical and healthcare tenant, few addresses in Manhattan make more sense, because the patient base and referral network are already here.

How Much Does Murray Hill Office Space Cost?

There are really two prices in Murray Hill. The one you’ll see quoted is the submarket average, about $72.14/SF in direct asking rent (Avison Young, Q1 2026), which already runs under Midtown’s $78.23/SF and well under the $85.28/SF Class A average (Cushman & Wakefield, April 2026). That’s reasonable for a Midtown address this close to Grand Central.

The other price is what most tenants actually pay. The Park Avenue towers pull that average up; move a block west to Madison or east toward the river and the prewar buildings often run $45 to $65/SF (Metro Manhattan internal research, May 2026). Two buildings on the same block can quote very different rents, so it pays to tour widely rather than anchor on a single number. Before you start, our Office Space Calculator will help you pin down how much space you actually need.

Class A and Trophy Space

Class A in Murray Hill mostly means Park Avenue. One Park Avenue, Vornado’s 943,000 SF tower at 32nd Street, leads the group: NYU Langone holds it down on a lease through 2050, and it recently came through a roughly $395 million renovation (Vornado). Heading up the avenue you’ll find 100 Park Avenue (SL Green, at 40th near Grand Central), 2 Park Avenue (the 1928 Art Deco landmark Haddad Brands bought in 2024), and 3 Park Avenue (Cohen Brothers, with a Pelli Clarke Pelli redesign). None of these are trophy buildings in the Plaza District mold, but they’re well-run, well-located, and priced below the Midtown Class A average.

If you’re weighing what actually separates a trophy tower from standard Class A, our piece on how trophy buildings set themselves apart explains the difference, and our roundup of the top Class A buildings in Midtown shows where Murray Hill’s Park Avenue stock fits in.

Class B Space

Most leasing in Murray Hill happens in Class B, and so does most of the value. Madison Avenue and the side streets are lined with prewar towers, some renovated with new lobbies and move-in-ready suites, others left largely as they were. A well-kept Class B floor here can feel like Class A in a pricier neighborhood, for a lot less. 180 Madison and 183 Madison sit at the renovated end of the range, with plainer buildings below them.

Rents sit well under the $72 average, and how far under depends on the building and the block (Metro Manhattan internal research, May 2026). Two Class B towers a block apart can quote very different numbers on the same day, shaped by how much space the landlord is sitting on and how he reads your company’s credit. It’s worth seeing several before you decide what counts as a normal rent.

Class C and Value Space

The lowest rents are in the older, un-renovated buildings, many of them on the side streets and toward the East River, along with the smaller medical and general-office space east of Park. These work well for small practices, back-office teams, and nonprofits, anyone who wants the Midtown location without the full Midtown rent.

One caveat at this end of the market: no firm publishes a reliable Class C average for Murray Hill, so treat any single quoted figure with some skepticism. The read here is Metro Manhattan internal research (May 2026). If you want the full breakdown of how the classes differ, our explainer on what makes a building Class A, B, or C covers it.

Lease Concessions and Effective Rent

Concessions are where tenants tend to under-negotiate. They focus on the asking rent, shave a few dollars, and sign, without pressing on free rent or the build-out allowance, which is often where the bigger savings are. With availability at 22.4%, the highest in Midtown (Avison Young, Q1 2026), there’s more room to push here than almost anywhere in the district, particularly in the Madison Avenue and side-street buildings.

The ranges below reflect typical recent deals on a 5 or 10-year term (Metro Manhattan internal research, May 2026); shorter terms tend to get less, longer terms more. If you’re unsure how long to commit, our comparison of 3-year, 5-year, and 10-year lease terms walks through the trade-offs.

Which Businesses Lease in Murray Hill?

Murray Hill’s tenant mix looks different from the rest of Midtown. Healthcare leads, with practices clustered around NYU Langone east of Park. Alongside them are nonprofits and associations on Madison, fashion and showroom tenants on the Fifth Avenue edge near NoMad, finance and law firms in the Park Avenue towers, and a growing number of small and midsize companies that left Midtown South for lower rent. Find your industry in the table below to narrow things down quickly.

For a small team or a newer practice, Murray Hill is one of the easier Midtown addresses to afford. Between the value buildings on Madison and the side streets and that 22.4% availability, a Midtown location costs less than the district’s reputation would suggest. If you’re comparing neighborhoods, our guide to the best NYC neighborhoods for small businesses lines them up, and if you’re moving out of a shared workspace, here’s how to think about scaling from coworking to your own office. One exception: if you specifically want exposed brick and timber loft space, that’s really a Midtown South search, so start in Chelsea or SoHo instead.

Top Office Buildings and Amenities in Murray Hill

Murray Hill isn’t competing with the Plaza District on amenities, and it doesn’t try to. Its strengths are location and value: a Midtown address next to Grand Central, the Empire State Building on its edge, and prewar buildings with light and detail that newer towers can’t really replicate. The Park Avenue Class A buildings have the updated systems and renovated lobbies; the Madison and side-street buildings trade some of that polish for a lower rent. The space falls into three tiers:

Renovated Class A (One Park Avenue, 100 Park Avenue, 180 Madison): updated lobbies and systems, efficient floor plates, and easy transit. One Park is a LEED Silver tower largely leased to its medical anchor. This is the top of the submarket.

Class B and value (183 Madison, 171 Madison, and the wider Madison and side-street stock): prewar construction, tall windows, attended lobbies, and a growing supply of move-in-ready suites, usually a short walk from Grand Central and the 6 train.

Medical and specialized (the East 38th and East 34th Street cluster): purpose-built and converted medical space tied to NYU Langone, from ambulatory care to orthopedics, on the streets running east toward Kips Bay.

Featured Buildings

• One Park Avenue: Vornado’s 943,000 SF Class A tower at 32nd and Park, a 1926 York & Sawyer building given a roughly $395 million renovation and LEED Silver certification, about 67% leased to NYU and NYU Langone through 2050, with Robert A.M. Stern Architects, Equinox, and Clarins also in the building. See the building profile.
• 3 Park Avenue: Cohen Brothers Realty’s 625,000 SF Class B tower at 34th Street, built in 1975 by the Empire State Building’s architects and redesigned by Pelli Clarke Pelli, with roughly 23,000 SF floor plates and a public high school in its lower floors. See the building profile.
• 100 Park Avenue: SL Green’s 36-story tower at 40th Street on the Grand Central edge, built in 1949 and a reliable source of Class A space at the north end of the submarket. See the building profile.
• 2 Park Avenue: the Art Deco landmark at 32nd Street, a 1928 Ely Jacques Kahn tower that Haddad Brands bought in 2024, known for its setback massing and colored terra-cotta crown. (No metro profile yet; leave as text.)
• 180 Madison Avenue: the Clarett Group’s roughly 280,000 SF Class A tower (managed with PGIM Real Estate), a renovated 1927 building with LEED Gold certification near the NoMad edge. See the building profile.
• 183 Madison Avenue (the Madison Belmont Building): a roughly 270,000 SF prewar Class A building with about 15,000 SF floor plates over 19 floors. See the building profile.
• 171 Madison Avenue: a boutique prewar Class B building, with a smaller, lower-cost floor plate typical of Murray Hill’s value stock. See the building profile.
• Empire State Building (350 Fifth Avenue): Empire State Realty Trust’s 2.7 million SF LEED Gold landmark on Murray Hill’s Fifth Avenue edge, with some of the most amenity-rich office space on this side of Midtown. See the building profile.
• NYU Langone medical cluster (240 and 333 East 38th, 317 East 34th): the outpatient, orthopedic, and medical-arts buildings that anchor Murray Hill’s healthcare corridor east toward Kips Bay. (No metro profiles; leave as text.)

Implementation note: link each building name above to its Metro Manhattan building profile where one exists.

Browse all Midtown buildings, or filter the active listings by size and price.

Major Office Landlords in Murray Hill

Who owns a building can matter as much as which building you pick, since each Murray Hill landlord operates differently. Vornado owns One Park Avenue outright and runs it around its medical tenant. SL Green, the largest office landlord in the city, holds 100 Park. Cohen Brothers treats 3 Park as a flagship. Empire State Realty Trust runs the Empire State Building on the Fifth Avenue edge, and the Clarett Group (with PGIM) and Haddad Brands hold renovated Class A space on Madison and Park. Most of the negotiating room, though, is with the many smaller private owners who control the prewar value stock on Madison and the side streets. A broker who works the area will already know which owners fund build-outs and which dig in. For more on the major players, see our piece on the biggest commercial real estate landlords in NYC.

Transportation and Commuting to Murray Hill

On transit, Murray Hill is hard to beat, mostly because Grand Central sits right on its northern edge. Staff coming in on Metro-North or the LIRR land a short walk away, thanks to Grand Central and the Grand Central Madison terminal. For subway riders, the 6 runs straight through the neighborhood, and the 4, 5, 7, and S all stop at the terminal. To compare actual door-to-door times, plug your team’s home addresses into our Commute Calculator.