Hyundai pays $273.5M to Vanbarton Group for office in Tribeca

Hyundai Motor Group through the entity 15 Laight NY LLC paid $273.5 million to the Vanbarton Group through the entity 13-17 Laight NY LLC for office building (O6) at 15 Laight Street in Tribeca, Manhattan.
The deal closed on February 15, 2023 and was recorded on February 15, 2023. The property has 117,291 square feet of built space according to PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per built square foot is $2,331 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 September 22, 2016, for $90 million. The signatory for Vanbarton Group was Justin B. Kleinman. The signatory for Hyundai Motor Group was Woojoo Kim. The contract date was December 21, 2022. Bloomberg first reported the sale, identifying Hyundai as the buyer, and will use it as a showroom.

Prior sales and revenue

Prior to this transaction, PincusCo has no record that the buyer Hyundai Motor Group had purchased any other properties and has no record it sold any properties over the past 24 months.
The seller Vanbarton Group purchased 10 properties in two transactions for a total of $164 million and sold 38 properties in five transactions for a total of $311.6 million over the same time period.

The property

The 15 Laight Street parcel has frontage of 99 feet and is 140 feet deep with a total lot size of 13,868 square feet. The lot is irregular. The zoning is C6-2A which allows for up to 6 times floor area ratio (FAR) for commercial and up to 6.02 times FAR for residential with inclusionary housing. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $27.5 million.The most recent loan totaled $98 million and was provided by MSD Partners on December 9, 2021.

Violations and lawsuits

There were no lawsuits or bankruptcies filed against the property since September of 2020. In addition, according to city public data, the property has received $935 in OATH penalties in the last year.

Development

On the lot, there is one active major alteration construction project for a 80,776 square-foot B building. The project was developed by Jeremy Sedrish with plans filed March 28, 2019 and permitted October 24, 2019.

The neighborhood

In Tribeca, the bulk, or 49 percent of the 16 million square feet of commercial built space are office buildings, with elevator buildings next occupying 27 percent of the space. In sales, Tribeca has near average sales volume among other neighborhoods with $388.8 million in sales volume in the last two years and is the 26th highest in Manhattan. For development, Tribeca has 3 times the average amount of major developments relative to other neighborhoods and is the 8th highest in Manhattan. It had 3 million square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 19 percent of the neighborhood’s built space.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of one of the 17 commercial properties representing 97,814 square feet of the 443,250 square feet. The identified owner is Vanbarton Group.
There are no active new building construction projects on this tax block.

The majority, or 59 percent of the 165,097 square feet of built space are office buildings, with hotel buildings next occupying 40 percent of the space.

The seller

The PincusCo database currently indicates that Vanbarton Group owned at least 20 commercial properties in New York City with 2,518,749 square feet and a city-determined market value of $896.8 million. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) The portfolio has $1.3 billion in debt, with top three lenders as Blackstone Group, Blackstone Mortgage Trust, and Brookfield Asset Management respectively. Within the portfolio, the bulk, or 71 percent of the 2,518,749 square feet of built space are office properties, with elevator properties next occupying 15 percent of the space. The bulk, or 93 percent of the built space, is in Manhattan, with Bronx next at 7 percent of the space.

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