Investor pays $8.5M for retail in Greenwich Village, controls 7 of 8 units in mixed-use building

An affiliate of investor Uttkarsh Lal through the entity 14th Street Commercial Unit LLC paid $8.5 million to Joseph Sutton and Marc Sutton, who are executives of Kids Town Inc., through the entity 10 East 14th Street Realty Associates, LLC for the retail condominium unit at the base of 10 East 14th Street in Greenwich Village, Manhattan. The expected use is cash flowing. The block-through, mixed-use building with one commercial unit and seven residential units has frontage on 13th Street, with an address of 5 East 13th Street.

Uttkarsh Lal has been buying residential units in the building since 2007, and with this purchase now owns all the units in the building other than the penthouse unit.
The deal closed on August 29, 2024 and was recorded on September 3, 2024. The condo unit has 6,522 square feet of built space according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per built square foot is $1,303 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 Joseph Sutton and Marc Sutton was Joseph Sutton and Marc Sutton. The signatory for Uttkarsh Lal was Terrell Stevens. The contract date was August 29, 2024.

A partnership that listed Cayre Industries and separately Stanley Chera, bought the building in 1984 for $2.5 million. But by 1989, the signatories on a loan were Joseph Sutton and Marc Sutton, each identified as partners. They are members of the larger Syrian community in Brooklyn, but are not related to investor Jeff Sutton of Wharton Properties, who has a son named Joseph Sutton.

In 2004, Marc and Joseph divided the building into two commercial condominiums, one for the retail condo that has 3,340 square feet on the ground floor and 3,182 square feet on a lower level, and another unit for the residential with about 16,692 square feet. They sold the residential unit in 2004 for $4.55 million.

Then in 2006, the residential unit owner divided that portion of the building into seven residential units, and sold them to buyers. Affiliated entities of Uttkarsh Lal of SBL Real Estate Partners have purchased seven of the eight units in the building, including six of the seven residential condos and now the retail unit. The only unit not owned by Uttarsh Lal was purchased in February 2021. Lal purchased his first unit in the building in 2007, then in 2021 started buying the other units.

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 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 3.5 times the average sales volume among other neighborhoods with $907.8 million in sales volume in the last two years and is the 8th highest in Manhattan. For development, Greenwich Village has 2.6 times the average amount of major developments relative to other neighborhoods and is the 12th 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.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of six of the 10 commercial properties representing 124,009 square feet of the 504,428 square feet. The largest owner is CB Developers, followed by C. Gershon Company and then Witnick Real Estate Partners.
There are no active new building construction projects on this tax block.

The majority, or 73 percent of the 504,428 square feet of built space are hotel buildings, with elevator buildings next occupying 17 percent of the space.

Direct link to Acris document. link