Cohen Brothers

• June 2024 New York New Developments
• Major Developments: New York City’s Conversion Accelerator Program has received interest from 64 office landlords seeking to convert their office properties to housing. Four buildings that have already been converted or begun construction through the accelerator, creating about 2,100 apartments. 650 First Avenue and 980 Sixth Avenue have received permits to begin renovations for reuse. The accelerator, announced in August, assists developers in navigating city laws and bureaucracy to expedite complex conversion projects. Coupled with Mayor Eric Adams’ plan to rezone Midtown, the initiative's aim is to create 20,000 apartments from underutilized office stock over the next decade. City Planning …
  
  
• April 2024 New York New Developments
• Major Developments: Owners of the retail condos at 697 Fifth Avenue, 647 Fifth Avenue and 205 East 59th Street are suing the city’s Department of Finance, claiming its tax assessments are too high. The anchor tenants at all of these buildings have either ended or renegotiated leases since 2022. The Real Estate Board of New York has proposed increasing average wages and benefits paid to construction workers on projects receiving a new version of the 421a property tax program. Leaders of the Building and Construction Trades Council rejected the offer. The Department of Environmental Protection is going after 2,400 “chronically …
  
  
• January 2024 New York New Developments
• Major Developments: Gov. Kathy Hochul signed the LLC Transparency Act but made a critical change to keep information on limited liability companies out of public view. The owners behind these entities will have to disclose their names and business addresses to the state government, which will keep it confidential. The governor signed a bill that expands the definition of fraud in rent overcharge cases. Governor Hochul unveiled plans for more than 2,800 homes in Queens. The governor will tap industry to revamp 58 acres of underutilized land at Creedmoor Psychiatric Center. 1,633 homes will be for sale, as two-story homes …
  
  
• September 2023 New York New Developments
• Major Developments: Blackstone and Hudson Pacific Properties are joining with Vornado to build a new film studio on Manhattan’s West Side. Dubbed Sunset Pier 94 Studios, the project would be developed as a public-private partnership with New York City Economic Development Corp. The total investment from the three publicly traded firms will be about $350 million. The campus would span 266,000 SF with six soundstages. The development would feature a 1,850 SF amenity space, 25,000 SF of waterfront open space. Vornado has the long-term leasehold on Pier 94 and is providing the lease to the joint venture, in which it …
  
  
• October 2022 New York Commercial Real Estate Market Report
• Office: September office occupancy numbers may represent a new normal. As more companies are settling into a wide range of work policies, from full-time, never or somewhere in between. The pandemic-induced drop in office use is projected to have a devastating effect on the market. The city’s office buildings will fall in value by 28%, or $49 billion. The stretch along Third Avenue from 42nd Street to 59th Street is becoming a stark example of the downside to the city’s ongoing flight to quality. The city’s office vacancy rate is at 19%, it is 29% on the 17-block corridor, nearly …
  
  
• July 2020 New York Buildings For Sale
• Buildings For Sale: Residential Cooperatives / Condominiums In the past few years, developers have rushed to build scores of glitzy new projects, flooding the market and spoiling buyers for choice. There are now more than 15,000 unsold condos in the city. Of that 15,000 more than 15% or around 2,600 units is in just six buildings. Lenders are largely working with the building owners to give them time for the market to stabilize. Some of the inventory will be repositioned. In New York City, some developers are hoping to clear a glut of unsold units by offering bulk deals at …
  
  
• August 2019 New York Commercial Real Estate Market Report
• Manhattan leasing activity which includes both renewals and new leases totaled 20.26 million square feet. The first half of 2019 saw 15% less activity than the second half of 2018, but this was still 12.2% above the five year average. Asking rents continued to rise to record highs, with an average of $77.82 across Manhattan and $84.51 in Midtown in large part to a boom in Downtown. Office leasing in Midtown South was flat year-over-year with 7.02 million square feet in total volume. TAMI tenants were on top here with 54% of total activity from WarnerMedia’s 1.3 million-square-foot sale-leaseback deal …
  
  
• April 2019 New York New Developments
• Major Developments: Gyms and athletic wear retailers once again dominated the retail leasing scene last month in New York City, securing four of the top 10 biggest deals. The rest mostly comprised of restaurants. The biggest retail lease deals signed last month totaled 188,100 square feet, down 41,600 square feet from January’s total of 229,700 square feet. In February of 2018, the top 10 retail leases totaled 108,200 square feet. Hermès of Paris inked a lease for 40,000 square feet of space at 706 Madison Avenue for a new flagship location. The building’s landlord is Friedland Properties. Brooklyn Boulders signed …
  
  
• April 2016: New York New Developments
• New Developments Bizzi& Partners, Michael Shvo and New Valley raised $175 million through the EB-5 program from the Chinese for their 91-story tower at 125 Greenwich Street. The developers were about halfway to reaching their goal through the EB-5 program.Vornado plans to combine its One Penn and Two Penn Plaza office buildings to form a 4.2 million-square-foot complex. New renderings for the combined building of one and two Penn plaza show a new glass facade and canopy over Seventh Avenue from Penn Station revealing a reorganized lower-level retail space.Banks are exercising more caution when it comes to financing commercial real …
  
  
• December 2015: New York New Developments
• New Developments AvalonBay Communities is planning a new 33-story, mixed-use residential tower at the site of the former American Bible Society located in Lincoln Square. The building will house 160 apartments. There will also be 34,000 square feet of retail space on the lower levels.Vornado Realty Trust lauded a third quarter that saw it sign seven Manhattan office leases at asking rents of over $100 per square foot. Vornado completed 43 office leasing deals totaling 509,000 square feet in the third quarter at an average starting rent of $79.80 per square foot. The total year-to-date leasing activity was nearly 1.7 …
  
  
• March 2010 New York New Developments
• Major Developments Affordable housing programs throughout the city are facing trouble unloading units. The city has been praised across the country for its efforts to provide affordable housing to lower- and middle-income households but, while the low-income rentals continue to thrive, the ownership program is struggling, which could be seen as good since it ultimately means less foreclosures.Larry Silverstein believes his commitment to the World Trade Center redevelopment project can be measured not only by his enthusiasm, but also by his own cash. The developer recently proposed several different financing options to the Port Authority of New York & New …
  
  
• July 2007 New York Buildings For Sale
• New York Buildings sold 60 Wall Street, a 47-story, 1.6 million sf office building, was sold to Paramount Group for $1 , 200 million. Harlem portfolio, 4,000 residential units, was sold to Urban American Management; City Investment Fund for $940 million. 885 Third Avenue (Lipstick Building), a 587,000 sf office building, was sold to Metropolitan Real Estate Investors for $607 million. 229 West 43rd Street (New York Times Building), a 746,000 sf office building, was sold to Africa Israel Investments for $525 million. Brooklyn and Queens portfolio of 2,000 residential units was sold for $250 million. 1328 Broadway (2 Herald …