Brause Realty pays $16.5M for office in Flatiron District

Brause Realty through the entity 37 Usw Owner LLC paid $16.5 million to Martin Feinberg through the entity Winner Communications, Inc. for the office building (O5) at 37 Union Square West in Flatiron District, Manhattan.
The deal closed on June 24, 2024 and was recorded on July 1, 2024. The property has 19,434 square feet of built space and 25,650 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 45,080 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per built square foot is $849 and the price per buildable square foot is $366 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 Martin Feinberg was Martin Feinberg. The signatory for Brause Realty was David A. Brause. The contract date was June 7, 2024. Martin Feinberg of Winner Communications bought the property in 1983 financed with a $600,000 loan.

Prior sales and revenue

Prior to this transaction, PincusCo has no record that the buyer Brause Realty had purchased any other properties and has no record it sold any properties over the past 24 months.
The seller Martin Feinberg had not purchased any other properties and had not sold any properties over the same time period.

The property

The office building in Flatiron District has 19,434 square feet of built space and 25,650 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 45,080 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has frontage of 30 feet and is 150 feet deep with a total lot size of 4,508 square feet. The zoning is C6-4 which allows for up to 10 times floor area ratio (FAR) for commercial and up to 10 times FAR for residential with inclusionary housing. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $11.6 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 Flatiron District, The majority, or 71 percent of the 23.2 million square feet of commercial built space are office buildings, with elevator buildings next occupying 15 percent of the space. In sales, Flatiron District has near average sales volume among other neighborhoods with $283.4 million in sales volume in the last two years and is the 26th highest in Manhattan. For development, Flatiron District has 2.4 times the average amount of major developments relative to other neighborhoods and is the 14th highest in Manhattan. It had 2.6 million square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 11 percent of the neighborhood’s built space. There was one pre-foreclosure suit filed among other office buildings in the past 12 months.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of seven of the 13 commercial properties representing 343,343 square feet of the 568,235 square feet. The largest owner is United American Land, followed by Solil Management and then Robert Mannheimer.
There are no active new building construction projects on this tax block.

The majority, or 52 percent of the 568,235 square feet of built space are office buildings, with elevator buildings next occupying 35 percent of the space.

The buyer

The PincusCo database currently indicates that Brause Realty owned at least nine commercial properties with 279 residential units in New York City with 1,053,474 square feet and a city-determined market value of $229.1 million. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) The portfolio has $125 million in debt, with top three lenders as JPMorgan Chase, Apple Bank for Savings, and Minnesota Life Insurance Company respectively. Within the portfolio, the bulk, or 71 percent of the 1,053,474 square feet of built space are office properties, with elevator properties next occupying 26 percent of the space. The bulk, or 82 percent of the built space, is in Queens, with Manhattan next at 18 percent of the space.

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