Andy Wu pays $4.7M to R.A. Cohen for 8-unit walkup in Chelsea

Andy Fred Wu paid $4.7 million to R.A. Cohen & Associates through the entity Ben 22 Associates LLC for eight-unit residential walkup building (C1) at 413 West 22nd Street in Chelsea, Manhattan.
The deal closed on March 7, 2023 and was recorded on March 17, 2023. The property has 3,500 square feet of built space and 947 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 4,443 square feet according to PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per built square foot is $1,342 and the price per buildable square foot is $1,057 per the PincusCo analysis. (The price per square foot analysis is the transaction price divided by square feet as reported in public records and assumes no air rights have been sold.)
The seller bought the property on April 25, 2022, for $3.4 million. The signatory for R.A. Cohen & Associates was Robert A. Cohen. The signatory for Andy Fred Wu was Andy Fred Wu.

Prior sales and revenue

Prior to this transaction, PincusCo has no record that the buyer Andy Fred Wu had purchased any other properties and has no record it sold any properties over the past 24 months.
The seller R.A. Cohen & Associates purchased seven properties in three transactions for a total of $19.5 million and sold one property in one transaction for a total of $5.9 million over the same time period. The former owners according to the Department of Housing Preservation and Development includes Robert Cohen, head officer and Ralph Della Cava, officer. The business entities are Ra Cohen & Associates, Inc. and Ben 22 Associates Llc.

The property

The 413 West 22nd Street parcel has frontage of 15 feet and is 98 feet deep with a total lot size of 1,481 square feet. The zoning is R7B which allows for up to 3 times floor area ratio (FAR) for residential. The property is in the Chelsea Historic District Extension. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $2.2 million.

Violations and lawsuits

There were no lawsuits or bankruptcies filed against the property since September of 2020. In addition, according to city public data, the property has not received any significant violations in the last year.

Development

For the tax lot building, it received its initial certificate of occupancy on April 14, 2022. There are no active new building construction projects or major alteration projects with initial costs more than $5 million on this tax lot.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of eight of the 22 commercial properties representing 114,603 square feet of the 166,401 square feet. The largest owner is Robert Cohen, followed by R. A. Cohen & Associates and then Peter Tran.
There are no active new building construction projects on this tax block.

The majority, or 56 percent of the 160,325 square feet of built space are elevator buildings, with walkup buildings next occupying 32 percent of the space.

The seller

The PincusCo database currently indicates that R.A. Cohen & Associates owned at least 11 commercial properties in New York City with 150,848 square feet and a city-determined market value of $54.3 million. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) The portfolio has $44.6 million in debt, with top three lenders as JPMorgan Chase, First National Bank of Long Island, and Dime Community Bank respectively. Within the portfolio, the bulk, or 54 percent of the 150,848 square feet of built space are elevator properties, with walkup properties next occupying 38 percent of the space. The bulk, or 97 percent of the built space, is in Manhattan, with Brooklyn next at 3 percent of the space.

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