Artifact pays $17.8M to Soft Stone, Eisner Bros. for LES dev site

Artifact through the entity Artifact No. 75 LLC paid $17.8 million to Soft Stone Development and Eisner Bros. through the entity 75 Essex Equity LLC for the mixed-use building (K4) at 75 Essex Street in Lower East Side, Manhattan. The expected use is redevelopment.
The deal closed on March 26, 2026 and was recorded on April 8, 2026. The property has 12,876 square feet of built space and 5,348 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 18,218 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per built square foot is $1,378 and the price per buildable square foot is $974 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 signatory for Soft Stone Development and Eisner Bros. was Nechemia Weinberger . The signatory for Artifact was Javier Martinez . The contract date was November 4, 2025. Nechemia Weinberger’s Soft Stone develops property and is also a third-party construction manager of property. Sholom and Israel Eisner’s Eisner Bros. owned 75% and Soft Stone owned 25%, per court records. Maverick Real Estate Partners filed a state court case in 2024, 654507/2024, and the borrowers filed for bankruptcy in 2025, 1-25-41388-nhl. Israel Eisner died July 31, 2025.

The Soft Stone website shows a plan for conversion and addition at 75 Essex Street.

Prior sales, articles and revenue

Prior to this transaction, PincusCo has records that the buyer Artifact purchased three properties in three transactions for a total of $5 million and has no record it sold any properties over the past 24 months.
The seller Soft Stone Development had not purchased any other properties and had not sold any properties over the same time period.

The property

The mixed-use building in Lower East Side has 12,876 square feet of built space and 5,348 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 18,218 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has frontage of 51 feet and is 96 feet deep with a total lot size of 5,296 square feet. The zoning is C6-1 which allows for up to 6 times floor area ratio (FAR) for commercial and up to 3.44 times FAR for residential. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $1.7 million.

Violations and lawsuits

The property was involved in two lawsuits and one bankruptcy over the past two years. The highest value suit was a $9 million money judgment concerning a loan filed on August 28, 2024, by Maverick Real Estate Partners against Softstone Development, Nechemia Weinberger, Israel Eisner, and Sholom Eisner. The bankruptcy was filed on March 25, 2025, by Softstone Development citing assets of $9 million. In addition, according to city public data, the property has received one DOB violation in the last year.

Development

There are no active new building construction projects or major alteration projects with initial costs more than $1 million on this tax lot.

The neighborhood

In Lower East Side, The majority, or 51 percent of the 23.8 million square feet of commercial built space are elevator buildings, with walkup buildings next occupying 21 percent of the space. In sales, Lower East Side has 1.5 times the average sales volume among other neighborhoods with $510 million in sales volume in the last two years and is the 21st highest in Manhattan. For development, Lower East Side has had very little major development activity relative to other neighborhoods.It had 1.1 million square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 5 percent of the neighborhood’s built space. There were 148 pre-foreclosure suit filed among other mixed-use buildings in the past 12 months.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of 14 of the 19 commercial properties representing 183,898 square feet of the 240,350 square feet. The largest owner is Sma Equities, followed by Baruch Singer and then Martin Amdur.
On the tax block, there was one new building construction project filed totaling 31,986 square feet. It is a 41-unit, 31,986 square-foot residential (R-2) building submitted by Sharon Huang with plans filed March 23, 2020 and it has not been permitted yet.

The majority, or 58 percent of the 240,350 square feet of built space are walkup buildings, with office buildings next occupying 19 percent of the space.

The buyer

The PincusCo database currently indicates that Artifact owned at least 17 commercial properties with 72 residential units in New York City with 122,364 square feet and a city-determined market value of $23.4 million. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) The portfolio has $52 million in debt, with top three lenders as Genesis Capital, Connectone Bank, and Bank Hapoalim respectively. Within the portfolio, the bulk, or 34 percent of the 122,364 square feet of built space are industrial properties, with mixed-use properties next occupying 17 percent of the space. They are all located in Manhattan.

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