The time is now for building deals and other stories to watch after Labor Day

Labor Day’s over and the power players are heading back to town from their summer escapes. So get ready for some🌊 serious ▨dealmaking after a long, dry season.

Or will there be a serious bust instead?

In the spirit of “fall preview” entertainment coverage, h⭕ere is Realty Check’s look at the big stories to watch in the months ahead.

WE WORRY: Commercial landlords, lenders and brokers are sweating it out as WeWork, now The We Company, readies its formal public offering in mid- or late September. Why? It’s merely the city’s largest office tenant, with more than five million square feet — more than the largest banks. It’s the sole tenant in four buildings here and owns outright the vacant, former Lord & Taylor building on Fifth Avenue. The fact that WeWork subleases its space ♉to other companies also makes it one of the biggest landlords, so its fortunes can have a huge impact on the whole commercial market.

WeWork had an operating loss of $1.37 billion for the first half of the year — twice its loss in 2018 — on $1.54 billion revenue. It hopes to raise between $3 billion and $4 billion in the stock offering, whicꦜh Forbes last week 🌃called “the most ridiculous IPO of 2019.”

MADISON AVENUE MISERY: Retail landlords and brokers are praying for anyone to rescue Barneys, the luxury retailer known for occupying nine stories on Madison Avenue on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. An entire empty building in the heart of the avenue’s prime shopping corri🐷dor would be calamitous when too many storefronts in the East 60s already stand empty.

HOTEL HELL: The city’s vast lodging industry is quaking over Mayor Bill de🎐 Blasio’s notion to limit new hotel development by requiring every new project to undergo the contentious and time-consuming land-use review procedure. It’s backed by Peter Ward’s hotel union, which would have a big say in whether any project could go ahead. Insiders say that de Blasio’s idea, which is merely a “study” at this point, will fly or crash by the end of th🀅e year.

EYES ON AMAZON: Spurned by Long Island City, the company’s supposedly being tempted by at least three Manhattan locations for new offices — Brookfield’s Manhattan West, Vornado’s Farley Post Office site and WeWork’s former Lord & Taylor building. But will Jeff Bezos bite?

Maybe Amazon was the secret ace in Brookfield’s pocket at 2 Manhattan West when the develﷺoper said last winter that it would build the tower even without an anchor tenant — although a completed deal with law firm Cravath Swaine, which signed a term sheet last spring, now appears certain.

CLOSELY WATCHED SITES: Maybe the crisp autumn air will bring news of what’s going to rise on long-dormant development sites: like Vornado and Lefrak’s big empty lot on West 57th Stree🍎t between Fifth and Sixth avenues; the Rockefeller Group’s vacant land (now up for sale) on West 48th Street between Sixth and Seventh avenues; and of course, Larry Silverstein’s site for 2 World Trade Center.

WAITING FOR NORDSTROM: The famed Seattle-based fashion retailer plans to open its first New York women’s department store at Extell’s Central Park Tower on West 57th Street on Oct. 24. All eyes will be on the 300,0𒀰00-square-foot emporium that launched months after Neiman Marcꦺus came to Hudson Yards, at a time when the department store business is under siege.

COMMERCIAL RENT CONTROL? A City Council bill to screw retail landlords who are already suffering enough, disguised as a “Small Business Jobs Survival Act,” would lead to more vacant stores than we already have. Although Council speaker Corey Johnson has so far declined to end🅺orse it, anything’s possible in that governmental body.

WESTFIELD’S WOES: Since two restaurants pulled out of deals for large spaces at 3 World Trade Center last year — Daniel Humm’s Eleven Madison Park group and British steakho♛use Hawksmoor — most of the tower podium’s highly visible 75,000 square feet of retail space remains embarrassingly empty. The Trade Center desperately needs a big new eatery or two; maybe this autumn will be the charm for Westfield.

WILL EMPIRE OUTLETS MAKE IT? The 350,000-square-foot shopping mall next to the Staten Island Ferry terminal in St. George was seven years in the making. But since it opened last spring, only 26 of 75 storefronts are open. Developer BFC Partners has a lot of work to do to avoid a lump of coal for the holida⛎ys.