THE W New York Tuscany at 120 E. 39th St. and the W New York Court at 130 E. 39th St., which sit on the same block between Park and Lexington avenues, are about to be marketed by Larry Wolfe at Eastdil Secured.
The hotels, among the first W’s ever developed, are operated by a single management team and are being sold together with an expected price tag of between $150 million and $160 million.
Wolfe told us they have a total of 325 rooms, which averaged 90 percent occupancy and $400-a-night room rates this year.
“They did very well,” said Wolfe. “They have been running at 85 to 90 percent occupancy for years.”
Many city hotels are experiencing a slowdown due to the economy both here and abroad.
However, while the current 80 percent occupancy here translates into a bummer for hoteliers, most nights New York City is still totally sold out and considered by most experts to have too few hotels.
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While foreign investors have been getting their assets kicked, one had enough bucks left to kick the bricks Monday at SL Green Realty Corp.’s 485 Lexington Ave.
The 914,807-foot, 32-story tower takes up the entire blockfront between 46th and 47th streets.
In true SL Green fashion, the building is nearly fully leased with Citibank as its anchor and the rest as credit tenants with minimal ongoing rollovers.
There are only two available spaces now, and both are less than 20,000 feet. They have asking rents of between $58 to $65 a foot, according to CoStar.
During its conference call yesterday, SL Green executives agreed that the rental market is down 10 percent to 15 percent from its peak, and that they are making deals with “better concession packages.”
At one time in the not so distant past, 485 Lexington coulda been a contenda, likely selling for $1 billion.
Now, in the current marketplace, if it were for sale, it might only bring in $600 million or so.
It currently hosts a $450 million mortgage from Wachovia.
When we confronted the broker who our spies spotted bringing the investor to the building, he insisted it is not on the market, not for sale and may not ever be sold.
“This is a fishing expedition,” said Ron Cohen of Cushman & Wakefield about his client who is seeking to place equity in New York. “[SL Green] allowed him in as a courtesy. They did not hire us.”
Cohen said nothing could come from the visit as there is still a very large spread between what people are willing to pay and what sellers are willing to accept.
“This is not a transaction on the market with certain expectations,” he noted.
In fact, Cohen declared, “If you come to me and say you want to sell your building, I would tell you to wait. We are still in the earth quake mode. The markets are very shaky and it is a difficult time. We will try to survive the earthquake and then we can all settle down and deal with a new reality.”
The major stum bling block for sales, of course, is the fact there is no financing available for any deals over $30 million.
