CIM acquires Greenwich Village office through UCC foreclosure, $48.6M transfer amount

Lender CIM Group through the entity Crec 88 Tower (Intermediate), LLC acquired the office building (O6) at 88 University Place in Greenwich Village, Manhattan, through a UCC foreclosure from former owner Arch Companies’s entity 88 Tower LLC. The city transfer price was $48.6 million. The expected use is cash flowing.
The deal closed on September 19, 2024 and was recorded on October 17, 2024. The property has 70,642 square feet of built space according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per built square foot is $687 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 May 23, 2022, for $31.1 million. The Real Deal reported in July that A bankruptcy judge ruled June 21, 2024, that the UCC foreclosure could go ahead. Arch Companies is involved in a complex bankruptcy involving several state court actions, with Jeffrey Simpson battling the company’s equity investor, a Canadian family office called 35 Oak Holdings.

Prior sales and revenue

Prior to this transaction, PincusCo has no record that the buyer CIM Group had purchased any other properties and sold two properties in one transaction for a total of $17.6 million over the past 24 months.
The seller Arch Companies had not purchased any other properties and had not sold any properties over the same time period. The 70,642-square-foot property generated revenue of $6.1 million or $86 per square foot, according to the most recent income and expense figures.

The property

The office building in Greenwich Village has 70,642 square feet of built space according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has frontage of 31 feet and is 110 feet deep with a total lot size of 6,750 square feet. The lot is irregular. The zoning is C1-7 which allows for up to 2 times floor area ratio (FAR) for commercial and up to 6.02 times FAR for residential. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $29.1 million. The most recent loan totaled $48.4 million and was provided by CIM Group on May 23, 2022.

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 Greenwich Village, The bulk, or 24 percent of the 22.4 million square feet of commercial built space are specialty buildings, with hotel buildings next occupying 17 percent of the space. In sales, Greenwich Village has 3.7 times the average sales volume among other neighborhoods with $926.5 million in sales volume in the last two years and is the 8th highest in Manhattan. For development, Greenwich Village has 2.5 times the average amount of major developments relative to other neighborhoods and is the 13th highest in Manhattan. It had 2.8 million square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 13 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 four of the 10 commercial properties representing 99,043 square feet of the 138,850 square feet. The largest owner is Arch Companies, followed by Jonathan Posner and then Gould Investors.
There are no active new building construction projects on this tax block.

The majority, or 60 percent of the 138,850 square feet of built space are office buildings, with mixed-use buildings next occupying 27 percent of the space.

The seller

The PincusCo database currently indicates that Arch Companies owned at least 13 commercial properties with 216 residential units in New York City with 437,987 square feet and a city-determined market value of $72.6 million. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) The portfolio has $187.2 million in debt, with top three lenders as Madison Realty Capital, Valley National Bank, and CIM Group respectively. Within the portfolio, the bulk, or 54 percent of the 437,987 square feet of built space are mixed-use properties, with elevator properties next occupying 24 percent of the space. The bulk, or 55 percent of the built space, is in Queens, with Manhattan next at 34 percent of the space.

The buyer

The PincusCo database currently indicates that CIM Group owned at least six commercial properties with 732 residential units in New York City with 2,561,190 square feet and a city-determined market value of $477.9 million. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) Within the portfolio, the bulk, or 56 percent of the 2,561,190 square feet of built space are office properties, with D6 properties next occupying 44 percent of the space. The bulk, or 71 percent of the built space, is in Brooklyn, with Manhattan next at 29 percent of the space.

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