Lender Network Capital pays $17.5M for office in Chelsea, part of user as buyer trend

The owners of the Miami-based lending company Network Capital Funding through the entity 453 W 17th Street LLC paid $17.5 million to Neal Wainland and Robert Wainland through the entity The N.E.W. Corp. for the office building (O5) at 453 West 17th Street in Chelsea, Manhattan. The sale appeared in city property records today.

This sale is another example of users buying spaces to occupy them. Some recent examples include James Dyson’s investment company paying $60 million for a property in Soho one of his companies will occupy, artist Avery Singer paid $8.1 million in Greenpoint, and the Greene Grape wine store, paid $6.75 million to Phillip Myers for two mixed-use buildings in Fort Greene,
The property was being marketed by Brock Emmetsberger and Jameson Hill B6 Real Estate Advisors as a food and beverage location or a boutique office conversion. 453 West 17th Street setup
The deal closed on June 20, 2023 and was recorded on June 28, 2023. The property has 17,720 square feet of built space.

No air rights remain following a $17.7 million sale of development rights by the Wainland family to GDSNY and another entity in 2020.
The signatory for the Wainland family was Robert Wainland. The signatory for Network Capital Funding was Hung Vu Ngyun and company CEO Tri Minh Nguyen. The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Along with the sale documents, there is a subordination agreement, which says, “Lessor [the Tri Nguyen entity 453 W 17th Street LLC] and lessee [Network Capital Funding] have entered into an unrecorded lease agreement covering certain premises located at 453-455 W. 17th Street…” A source familiar with the transaction said it may not be finalized what portion of the property Network Capital would take, if any, despite the subordination agreement.

Prior sales and revenue

Prior to this transaction, PincusCo has no record that the buyer Network Capital Funding had purchased any other properties and has no record it sold any properties over the past 24 months.
The seller Neal Wainlands had not purchased any other properties and had not sold any properties over the same time period. The 17,720-square-foot property generated revenue of $1.2 million or $69 per square foot, according to the most recent income and expense figures.

The property

The office building in Chelsea has 17,720 square feet of built space according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has frontage of 50 feet and is 92 feet deep with a total lot size of 4,599 square feet. The zoning is C6-3 which allows for up to 6 times floor area ratio (FAR) for commercial and up to 7.52 times FAR for residential with inclusionary housing. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $5.1 million.

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 received one DOB violation in the last year.

Development

For the tax lot building, it received its initial certificate of occupancy on September 18, 2012. 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 Chelsea, The bulk, or 36 percent of the 52.4 million square feet of commercial built space are office buildings, with elevator buildings next occupying 28 percent of the space. In sales, Chelsea has the 5th highest sale turnover among other neighborhoods in the city with $2.3 billion in sales volume in the last two years. For development, Chelsea has 2 times the average amount of major developments relative to other neighborhoods and is the 18th highest in Manhattan. It had 2 million square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 4 percent of the neighborhood’s built space.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of four of the nine commercial properties representing 280,509 square feet of the 342,862 square feet. The largest owner is New York City Housing Authority, followed by Klovern and then Joseph Davoudzadeh.
On the tax block, there were two new building construction projects totaling 166,991 square feet. The largest is a 86,615 square-foot business (B) building submitted by Real Estate Equities Corporation and filed by Brandon Klein with plans filed December 12, 2018 and it has not been permitted yet. The second largest is a 80,376 square-foot business (B) building submitted by Michael Kirchman with plans filed December 6, 2019 and it has not been permitted yet.

The majority, or 74 percent of the 342,862 square feet of built space are elevator buildings, with industrial buildings next occupying 10 percent of the space.

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