Uber has just hailed a ride from Jackson Heights to Chelsea.
The app that connects riders with drivers in 118 cities and 36 countries — and looking to do so much more now that it may have a $10 billion valuation — will move into 52,350 square feet at the Terminal Stores building.
The company’s slice of the third floor will have Hudson River views through arched windows and its own elevator and entrance at 636-638 W. 28th St., as well as access to the full-block building’s other lobbies on 11th and 12th avenues.
Alexander Chudnoff, vice chairman of JLL, represented Uber in the 10-year lease, along with Dan Turkewitz and Brittany Wunsch.
The building owner, Waterfront New York Realty, was represented in-house by Christopher Flagg and brothers Chris and Peter Pachios.
Uber was founded in 2009, and by May 2011 had three employees in a Brooklyn co-working space. In November 2012, Chudnoff found them 3,500 square feet at 27-55 Jackson Ave. in Long Island City.
They now have 50 workers, and the giant leap for Uber-kind will allow it to hire another 225 folks to serve over 80 cities around the world.
The deal had an asking rent in the mid- to high $40s per square foot and also includes expansion options. Floors can run well over 150,000 square feet across the multiple small structures that were cobbled together into the full-block brick storage, retail and office building.
Chudnoff said Uber wanted “funky” space similar to what it has at its San Francisco headquarters.
Designed by Scott Spector of the Spector Group, the Uber offices will have exposed brick and steel columns as well as digital walls and LED fixtures. We hear the rooms will reference Manhattan’s urban fabric and be unified with a “Broadway Thread.”
Another tech firm, Ventura, Calif.-based The Trade Desk, will expand and move to 13,121 square feet on the 17th floor of 386 Park Ave. South, at the northwest corner of 27th street, later this fall.
The company that runs the backbone for placing online ads is now a few blocks away on the full, 5,458 square-foot 12th floor of 12 W. 27th, which is now available for sublease.
Kevin Daly, now with Rudin Management, repped The Trade Desk while still with Cushman & Wakefield. C&W’s Paige Engeldrum is handling the sublease.
Paul Amrich, Ross Zimbalist and David Young of CBRE represented the building owners, a partnership of William Macklowe Co. and Principal Real Estate Invstors. The building is geared to tech, and asking rents run from $57 to $75 per square foot.
Time for new earplugs, as club owner Paul Seres has taken over the former XVI Lounge at 251 W. 48th St., where he will create The Attic in its 3,200 square-foot rooftop lounge and 1,500 square-foot penthouse.
The Attic has its own entrance around the corner from the main lobby of the building’s Hilton Garden Inn, which is owned by Hampshire Hotels & Resorts.
Shane Davis of the hospitality-focused SKH Realty represented Seres of Helios Hospitality Group, which is also co-owner of The DL, Apartment 13 and Rivington F+B.
New requirements for universal pre-kindergarten are having an impact on real estate, as day-care providers and schools rush to find new locations to serve the 53,604 children expected to show up this September.
The city will need seats for 69,643 pre-schoolers by 2015, with 61 percent of these, or 42,143 4-year-olds, expected to be served by community-based groups.
Stephen Powers is director of leasing at Denham Wolf, which is working with numerous clients seeking spots for tots. “The School Construction Authority is also looking, as well,” said Powers.
But the build-outs for pre-schools are costlier than for a regular office, explained Powers. Classrooms need bathrooms, while the schools need two means of egress, filtered air, fire and life-safety equipment, window guards and a lead-paint waiver.
The Department of Health is getting $10,250 per child and cutting a deal with the individual schools to pay them just a part of that money. “It will not cover the costs,” a school administrator confided.
Denham Wolf’s principal, Paul Wolf, believes that’s one reason the private schools will be the likely winners in the competition for the school spaces, as they can pay higher rents and can afford the infrastructure.
“I’ve heard it referred it to as an ‘arms race,’” said Wolf, “because…if there is a good space that works for a school, they want it.”
