The company controlling the Empire State Building has announced that a majority of its investors has approved a proposal to make the iconic building into a real estate investment trust or REIT. The plan is once the REIT has been established, its shares would be publicly traded.

According to Malkin Holding LLC, ninety percent of the two thirds of investors in the company have voted in favor of the plan to make the Empire State Building the central piece of an eighteen property REIT to be named Empire State Realty Trust Inc. The other investors will have a deadline of March 25 to vote on the conversion according to an application filed with the US SEC.

The building was built in 1931 and was the world's tallest for forty years. Back in 1961, investors were able to purchase US$10,000 for one of the 3,300 units from the Empire State Building Associates, the then owners of the building. The units amounted to private partnership shares, which can now be valued at US$320,000 per share.