Baruch Schwartz pays $5.9M to World Wide Group for retail in Chelsea

Baruch Schwartz through the entity 257 W17 Ep LLC paid $5.9 million to World Wide Group through the entity 257 Associates Borrower LLC for the retail condo at 257 West 17th Street in Chelsea, Manhattan. The expected use is cash flowing.
The deal closed on August 25, 2025 and was recorded on August 26, 2025. The property has 6,997 square feet of built space according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per built square foot is $843 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 World Wide Group was Jodi Gerstman . The signatory for Baruch Schwartz was Baruch Schwartz. The contract date was December 11, 2024.

Prior sales and revenue

Prior to this transaction, PincusCo has no record that the buyer Baruch Schwartz had purchased any other properties and has no record it sold any properties over the past 24 months.
The seller World Wide Group had not purchased any other properties and had not sold any properties over the same time period.

The property

The retail condo in Chelsea has 6,997 square feet of built space according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has a total lot size of 6,997 square feet. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $3.6 million.

Violations and lawsuits

There were no lawsuits or bankruptcies filed against the property for the past 24 months. In addition, according to city public data, the property has not received any significant violations 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 Chelsea, The bulk, or 35 percent of the 52.5 million square feet of commercial built space are office buildings, with elevator buildings next occupying 28 percent of the space. In sales, Chelsea has the 6th highest sale turnover among other neighborhoods in the city with $1.5 billion in sales volume in the last two years. For development, Chelsea has 1.5 times the average amount of major developments relative to other neighborhoods and is the 21st highest in Manhattan. It had 2.1 million square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 4 percent of the neighborhood’s built space. There were two pre-foreclosure suit filed among other retail buildings in the past 12 months.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of 11 of the 16 commercial properties representing 454,176 square feet of the 576,448 square feet. The largest owner is Pimco, followed by Meadow Partners and then Kano Real Estate Investors.
On the tax block, there was one new building construction project filed totaling 27,614 square feet. It is a 19-unit, 27,614 square-foot residential (R-2) building submitted by Pinner Development Group and filed by Reuben Pinner with plans filed December 5, 2024 and it has not been permitted yet.

The majority, or 50 percent of the 576,448 square feet of built space are office buildings, with retail buildings next occupying 19 percent of the space.

The seller

The PincusCo database currently indicates that World Wide Group owned at least three commercial properties with 675 residential units in New York City with 679,219 square feet and a city-determined market value of $155.5 million. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) The portfolio has $7.3 million in debt, borrowed from World Wide Group. Within the portfolio, all identified are elevator properties. The bulk, or 74 percent of the built space, is in Queens, with Brooklyn next at 26 percent of the space.

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