Capstone Equities signs $18.5M refi with Deutsche Bank for Life Hotel in Penn Plaza

Capstone Equities through the entity Life 31 LLC as borrower signed a refi loan with lender Deutsche Bank through the entity DBR Investments Co. Limited valued at $18.5 million for the Life Hotel building (H3) at 19 West 31st Street in Penn Plaza, Manhattan.
The deal closed on August 8, 2025 and was recorded on August 12, 2025. The prior lender was Maxim Capital Group which held debt that had an original loan amount of $18.4 million.The property has 37,213 square feet of built space and 11,823 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 49,060 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The loan price per built square foot is $497 and the price per buildable square foot is $377 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 owner bought the property on June 3, 2016, for $40.2 million. The signatory for Capstone Equities was Justin Adelipour . The signatory for Deutsche Bank was Peter Castro and David Bush.

The property

The hotel building in Penn Plaza has 37,213 square feet of built space and 11,823 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 49,060 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has frontage of 50 feet and is 98 feet deep with a total lot size of 4,906 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 $12.5 million. The most recent loan totaled 0.0 and was provided by Capstone Equities on December 30, 2022.

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 received $2,500 in ECB penalties and $6,835 in OATH penalties in the last year.

Development

For the tax lot building, it received its initial certificate of occupancy on June 22, 2018. 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 Penn Plaza, The majority, or 76 percent of the 20.4 million square feet of commercial built space are office buildings, with hotel buildings next occupying 8 percent of the space. In sales, Penn Plaza has had very little sales volume relative to other neighborhoods with $223.9 million in sales volume in the last two years. For development, Penn Plaza has 2.8 times the average amount of major developments relative to other neighborhoods and is the 10th highest in Manhattan. It had 4 million square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 20 percent of the neighborhood’s built space.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of 16 of the 28 commercial properties representing 1,545,239 square feet of the 1,746,232 square feet. The largest owner is Global Holdings Group, followed by Rosen Equities and then Capstone Equities.
On the tax block, there was one new building construction project filed totaling 59,149 square feet. It is a 27-unit, 59,149 square-foot residential (R-2) building submitted by Cottonwood Management and filed by Alex Shing with plans filed June 28, 2017 and it has not been permitted yet.

The majority, or 79 percent of the 1.7 million square feet of built space are office buildings, with retail buildings next occupying 8 percent of the space.

The borrower

The PincusCo database currently indicates that Capstone Equities owned at least eight commercial properties in New York City with 1,124,666 square feet and a city-determined market value of $184 million. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) The portfolio has $120.5 million in debt, with top three lenders as Argentic Investment Management, Aareal Capital, and Ellington Management Group respectively. Within the portfolio, the bulk, or 64 percent of the 1,124,666 square feet of built space are office properties, with hotel properties next occupying 36 percent of the space. The bulk, or 64 percent of the built space, is in Brooklyn, with Manhattan next at 36 percent of the space.

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