New York Buildings sold
Host Hotels & Resorts closed on the $313.5 million sale of the New York Helmsley Hotel, which will be reflagged under the Westin Hotels & Resorts brand in mid-2012 after an extensive renovation. Host Hotels, will renovate the hotel, at 212 East 42nd Street, with a complete overhaul of its 775 guest rooms as well as a meeting space upgrade.Dune Real Estate Partners has agreed to pay $190 million for Anglo Irish Bank's mortgage loan on the embattled Mark Hotel on the Upper East Side. The note, which had a face value of around $300 million, had several interested bidders, including Starwood Capital, in an offering that had been ongoing for months. Dune now plans to work with Alexico Group, the developer of the landmark, 84-year-old hotel, whose renovation and partial co-op conversion had landed the property in financial straits.
Savanna purchased the debt on 100 Wall Street from Prudential Real Estate Investors, with intent to take over the tower if Lehman Brothers, the current owner, defaults. Lehman Brothers took the property from Broadway Partners in 2009 when the firm couldn't pay its debts on the building; however the property is not profitable enough to overcome the debt services attached to it. Savanna has been extremely active on the New York market of late. The firm picked up four Manhattan buildings in the last 12 months, and announced its intentions to add up to six more in 2011
Russian composer Igor Krutoy closed on the 6,000-square-foot Plaza Hotel condominium, he paid $48 million for the 12th-floor pad. That's the priciest single condo ever sold in New York -- As the Wall Street Journal reported when the contract was signed, Krutoy and his wife, Olga, had been making offers on all the big-ticket condos in the city -- including the $55 million, two-unit combo at 15 Central Park West and equally stunning listings at the Time Warner Center -- before settling on the Plaza spread, which has views of Central Park but wasn't officially on the market.
Madison Avenue retail condo commands meaty price per square foot
A small, multi-level retail condominium on Madison Avenue has just sold for $4,471 per square foot, which, according to Prudential Douglas Elliman brokers Faith Hope Consolo and Joseph Aquino, is one of the highest prices ever for an Upper East Side retail condo. The space, at 1086 Madison Avenue, between 81st and 82nd streets, contains 400 square feet on the ground level, a 100-square-foot mezzanine and a 700-square-foot basement. Buyer Stanley Lobel, who owns Lobel's Fine Meats, paid $1.75 million for the store and plans to use it as an investment property that will house a fashion tenant.
Zara to pay $324M for 666 Fifth retail condo
In one of the city's largest-ever retail condominium deals, Spain's Inditex Group has agreed to pay $324 million to purchase 32,000 square feet at 666 Fifth Avenue for a new flagship Zara store, the company announced today. The space, formerly an NBA store, is roughly one-third of the 90,000 square feet purchased by Stanley Chera's Crown Acquisitions, the Carlyle Group and Kushner Companies for $525 million in 2008, according to the Wall Street Journal, which originally broke the news of the deal. The rest, which is currently leased by Uniqlo and Hollister, is also on the market. The purchase price for the Zara space includes the buyout of the remaining time on the NBA's lease, which sources said had less than three years before its expiration. Uniqlo's lease at 666 Fifth last year, in which it agreed to pay $300 million over 15 years, was among the city's most expensive retail leases ever.
Stock exchange sells two buildings for $65M
The New York Stock Exchange has sold two buildings, 123 Greenwich Street and 78-86 Trinity Place in the Financial District for a combined $65 million, according to Real Estate Weekly. The buildings, which the American Stock Exchange used for decades as office space and a trading floor (before the latter was moved to 11 Wall Street), were sold to two LLCs represented by Steinhardt Management. Cushman & Wakefield began marketing the buildings, which have a total of 336,000 square feet of office space, in 2008. The properties were up for landmark designation in 2008 but have not been landmarked yet.
NYC Buildings For Sale
$90M UES townhouse belonging to Lucille Roberts' estate poised to crush city records An Upper East Side townhouse originally commissioned by Frank Woolworth is about to shatter New York City records when it hits the market for $90 million, likely the highest-ever official asking price for a single-family home in Manhattan. 4 East 80th Street, the 17,676-square-foot mansion currently owned by the estate of fitness mogul Lucille Roberts, who died in 2003. Industry sources said its $90 million asking price will by far eclipse any other for a townhouse in New York City history; Aby Rosen's 22 East 71st Street and the mansion near Mayor Michael Bloomberg's, at 1016 Madison Avenue, were each, in 2008, asking $75 million. Neither property sold, and both have since slashed their asking prices.The Riese Organization is selling its landmarked I. Miller Shoe Building at 1552 Broadway, which contains 15,000 square feet, some air rights, and the foot traffic guarantee that comes with a location on Times Square's bow tie. The building, on the northeast corner of 46th Street and near Seventh Avenue, is currently home to a TGI Friday's and has two billboards that can be upgraded to LED signs, plus approval for a third sign. For entertainment history buffs, there are statues of actresses Ethel Barrymore, Marilyn Monroe, Mary Pickford and Rosa Ponsella on the second floor.
Brand new Williamsburg charter school facility hits the market for $30MThe developer of the brand new Williamsburg Charter High School facility at 198 Varet Street in East Williamsburg has put the 115,000-square-foot building on the market for $30 million. The eight-story property, which was completed in the fall of 2010 by private developer Paul Grossman, was custom-built for the school, a member of the Believe High School Network, and contains a fitnes center, two-story rock climbing wall and auditorium in addition to 58 classrooms and laboratories.
20 KFC franchises in the city head to auction
At least 20 Kentucky Fried Chicken franchises in New York City are going up for auction after the former owners filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection last year. The eateries -- 10 in Queens, eight in Brooklyn and two in Harlem -- average 2,000 square feet each, have around 15 years left on their leases and may go in groups or individually.
Hines Interests is looking to sell its 600,000-square-foot tower at 750 Seventh Avenue. The real estate investment firm purchased the 32-story building, half of which is occupied by Morgan Stanley, for $150 million in 2000 through a partnership with General Motors. That works out to $260 per square foot. It's unclear what Hines will be hoping to fetch for the 48th Street property, which is also home to Ernst & Young and Mendes and Mount.
Development site up for grabs near the U.N.
Four loans with an unpaid balance totaling $18.75 million are up for grabs at a stalled development site near the United Nations that has the potential to become a new hotel or consulate, are secured by the retail, residential and commercial properties at 844 Second Avenue, 302 East 45th Street, 303 East 44th Street and 304 East 44th Street. Plans for a high-end hotel or consulate there never got off the ground because of the tight construction market, but the current owners did consider moving air rights from the Second Avenue and 45th Street properties to the two on 44th Street to create nearly 75,000 square feet of development rights.
Kenmare Square retail condo asks $17M
The 11,400-square-foot duplex retail condominium at One Kenmare Square has hit the market for $17.25 million. The ground and lower floors of the glassy Soho building, developed by Andre Balazs and Cape Advisors at 211 Lafayette Street, are currently home to furniture retailer Mitchell Gold, and will be through March 2017, when its lease expires. The space contains 7,400 square feet on the ground floor and 4,000 in the basement, connected by a stairwell and elevator.
The French owners of Midtown's Hotel Novotel is for sale in a "strategic, targeted marketing process,". The 480-room hotel, at 226 West 52nd Street, is owned and operated by Accor SA, which also runs the Sofitel Luxury Hotels and Motel 6 chains. While New York hotel values haven't fully recovered from the real estate crash -- they're still 10 to 15 percent off their 2007 peak, according to HVS Global Hospitality Services -- Accor is looking to unload real estate assets and shift its focus to branding and management as part of a long-term strategy. As such, the Novotel's buyer will be required to retain Accor as hotel's manager.
Lehman Brothers Holdings is soliciting development partners for 75 real estate projects in 19 states.. Among the potential partners Lehman has its eye on: PulteGroup, Toll Brothers, Standard Pacific, DMB Associates, FivePoint Communities and Newland Communities. The company has some $2 billion in residential and master-planned communities in its portfolio, and all of the partners its bankruptcy restructuring firm has reached out to have experience developing those types of projects.
