A partnership led by Peter and Anthony Malkin has agreed to pay $9.5 million for the land underneath 122 W. 34th St.
The parcel purchased is underneath a four-story building at 122 W. 34th, which is totally attached and dependent on mechanicals from the office building next door at 112 W. 34th St.
The former Woolworth store at No. 122 currently hosts a Footlocker retail outlet with its offices above.
With 90,000 feet of showroom and offices, Aeropostale is the largest tenant in No. 112, which is getting a $60 million makeover that will now include stretching its new curtain wall facade over No. 122.
Massey Knakal repped the seller, a partnership of the Carr and Miccolino families.
Prudential supplied 100 percent financing on the purchase, said Anthony Malkin, whose company Wien & Malkin structured the transaction for their associated W&H Properties portfolio building.
*
Cuba’s Café, which is part of the Chelsea Dining Group, is coming to Hell’s Kitchen at a 900 foot space at 688 Tenth Ave., between 48th and 49th streets.
“It will be a high-style Cuban diner,” said Aaron Gavios of Square Foot Realty, who repped the tenant and whose partner, Howard Aaron, worked for the building owner.
Just two years ago, Gavios said rents on Tenth were $40 a foot and now corners are fetching $150.
“The corridor is changing overnight with a lot of luxury apartments and condominiums,” he said.
*
The Westchester and Fairfield counties markets are still space constrained, with rents holding and some concessions easing – though not all.
More than a dozen tenants are looking for around 100,000 feet, but half of them will likely renew.
“Where people can postpone a decision, they will,” said Jim Fagen of Cushman & Wakefield at a briefing yesterday in Greenwich, Conn.
Brokers quietly told us the 180,000 foot building that Royal Bank of Scotland will vacate when its new digs in Stamford are finished is now in contract to Heritage Realty Services for around $200 million, or north of $1,000 a foot.
With two atriums and three “pods” that have three floors each of 20,000 feet, the building is expected to lease up quickly as a multi-tenanted building.
Direct Class A rents in Greenwich average at $58.19, but can top $100 a foot.
Staubach handled the marketing of the sale.
George Constantin, president and CEO of Heritage, cited his confidentially agreement and declined to discuss the purchase.
But Constantin told us that his company is now bringing to market the former Comp USA space just south of Lord & Taylor at 420 Fifth Ave. in Manhattan.
The 74,000 feet of retail stretches “corner to corner” and has an asking rent over $150 a foot.
“A lot of foreign retailers are interested,” Constantin added.
