City pays $12.65M for school dev site in North Riverdale

The New York City School Construction Authority paid $12.65 million to two seller groups in two transactions for 6389 to 6393 Broadway, and a smaller adjacent lot with no address on Broadway, all in North Riverdale, the Bronx.

The New York City School Construction Authority is one of the most active buyers and developers in the city.

In the larger transaction, NYC School Construction Authority paid $9.2 million to members of the Loewy family through the entity ALT Van Cortlandt LLC for the (H4) at 6393 Broadway and 6389 Broadway in North Riverdale, Bronx.
The deal closed on April 11, 2024 and was recorded on April 23, 2024. The two properties have 17,964 square feet of built space and 54,388 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 72,350 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per built square foot is $512 and the price per buildable square foot is $127 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 the sellers, Jeffrey M. Loewy, Albert T. Loewy, and Claire R. Loewy was Rose Ngoma. The signatory for NYC School Construction Authority was Edward Perez. The contract date was May 24, 2023. The Loewy family has owned the parcels since at least 1966. This is the School Construction Authority’s third acquisition this year.

In the second, the NYC School Construction Authority paid $3.5 million to Vishal Patel through the entity VC Lodging LLC for the vacant property (G7) on Broadway in North Riverdale, Bronx. The deal closed on April 11, 2024 and was recorded on April 23, 2024. The property has zero square feet of built space and 7,047 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 7,047 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per buildable square foot is $489 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 Vishal Patel was Vishal Patel. The signatory for NYC School Construction Authority was Edward Perez. The contract date was May 24, 2023. The contract date was written in error as May 24, 2024, which is impossible since it’s after the closing date. We are using the date 5/24/2023 which was used in a purchase that was recorded by SCA the same day.

Because multiple properties have been transacted, some of the following sections will follow the property with the largest assessed value, which in this case, is the property on 6393 Broadway.

Prior sales and revenue

Prior to this transaction, PincusCo has records that the buyer NYC School Construction Authority purchased 17 properties in nine transactions for a total of $233.2 million and has no record it sold any properties over the past 24 months.
The seller Jeffrey M. Loewy had not purchased any other properties and had not sold any properties over the same time period. The former owners according to the Department of Housing Preservation and Development includes Vishal Patel, head officer and Bhavesh Patel, officer. The business entity is Vc Lodging Llc.

The property

The property in North Riverdale has 17,964 square feet of built space and 54,388 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 72,350 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has frontage of 156 feet and is 102 feet deep with a total lot size of 16,300 square feet. The zoning is R6 which allows for up to 2.43 times floor area ratio (FAR) for residential. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $1.7 million.

Violations and lawsuits

There were no lawsuits or bankruptcies filed against the properties for the past 24 months. In addition, according to city public data, the properties have received $2,200 in OATH penalties 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 block

On the tax block of 6393 Broadway, PincusCo has identified the owners of two of the 10 commercial properties representing 113,223 square feet of the 133,947 square feet. The two identified owners are W Group and Stagg Group.
There are no active new building construction projects on this tax block.

The majority, or 49 percent of the 133,947 square feet of built space are specialty buildings, with elevator buildings next occupying 35 percent of the space.

The buyer

The PincusCo database currently indicates that Nyc School Construction Authority owned at least 23 commercial properties in New York City with 361,304 square feet and a city-determined market value of $70.8 million. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) Within the portfolio, the bulk, or 36 percent of the 361,304 square feet of built space are office properties, with specialty properties next occupying 32 percent of the space. The bulk, or 74 percent of the built space, is in Queens, with Brooklyn next at 22 percent of the space.

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