James Halpin pays $4.6M to Emmut Properties for specialty in Hell’s Kitchen
James C. Halpin through the entity Manhattan West 48 LLC paid $4.6 million to Emmut Properties through the entity 608 Emmut Properties LLC for specialty building (P9) at 608 West 48th Street in Hell’s Kitchen, Manhattan.
The deal closed on September 14, 2022 and was recorded on October 4, 2022. The property has 4,920 square feet of built space and 7,630 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 12,550 square feet according to PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per built square foot is $934 and the price per buildable square foot is $366 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 March 14, 2019, for $5.5 million. The signatory for Emmut Properties was John Young. The signatory for James C. Halpin was James C. Halpin.
Prior sales and revenue
Prior to this transaction, PincusCo has no record that the buyer James C. Halpin had purchased any other properties and has no record it sold any properties over the past 24 months.
The seller Emmut Properties purchased five properties in two transactions for a total of $82.8 million and had not sold any properties over the same time period.
The property
The 608 West 48th Street parcel has frontage of 25 feet and is 100 feet deep with a total lot size of 2,510 square feet. The zoning is M2-4 which allows for up to 5 times floor area ratio (FAR) for manufacturing. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $839,000.
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 not received any significant violations in the last year.
Development
On the lot, there is one active new building construction project for a 12,480 square-foot B building. The project was developed by John Young of Emmut Properties with plans filed June 28, 2019 and it has not been permitted yet.
The neighborhood
In Hell’s Kitchen, the bulk, or 39 percent of the 41.9 million square feet of commercial built space are elevator buildings, with specialty buildings next occupying 17 percent of the space. In sales, Hell’s Kitchen has 3.8 times the average sales volume among other neighborhoods with $1.4 billion in sales volume in the last two years and is the 10th highest in Manhattan. For development, Hell’s Kitchen has 3.2 times the average amount of major developments relative to other neighborhoods and is the 5th highest in Manhattan. It had 3.1 million square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 7 percent of the neighborhood’s built space.
The block
On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of two of the eight commercial properties representing 256,163 square feet of the 416,264 square feet. The two identified owners are Brookfield Properties and Gottesman family.
On the tax block, there were three new building construction projects totaling 86,182 square feet. The largest is a 37,620-square-foot F-1 building developed by Gary Flom with plans filed April 27, 2015 and it has not been permitted yet.The second largest is a 36,082-square-foot S-1 building developed by Stephen Mcbride with plans filed May 19, 2017 and permitted June 17, 2019.
The majority, or 37 percent of the 416,264 square feet of built space are hotel buildings, with industrial buildings next occupying 36 percent of the space.
The seller
The PincusCo database currently indicates that Emmut Properties owned at least 11 commercial properties in New York City with 270,182 square feet and a city-determined market value of $62.1 million. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) The portfolio has $171.8 million in debt, with top three lenders as Benefit Street Partners, Shanghai Commercial Bank, and Keysite Capital Partners respectively. Within the portfolio, the bulk, or 49 percent of the 270,182 square feet of built space are hotel properties, with elevator properties next occupying 40 percent of the space. They are all located in Manhattan.
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