Lexin Capital files conversion, enlargement plans for 270-unit apartment building in Chelsea

Lexin Capital submitted a major alteration application for the conversion and enlargement of what is now a 12-story, 156,500 square-foot commercial (COM) building with no residential units at 229 West 28th Street in Chelsea, Manhattan, into a 35-story, 207,500-square-foot, residential tower with 270 apartments. The plan was filed with the New York City Department of Buildings on December 24, 2025 under job number M01336519. It calls for the increase in size of the building from a 13-story building with no dwelling units to a 35-story building with 270 dwelling units. The project is described in the filing as: conversion and enlargement of existing building as shown on filed plans. Metin Negrin , president of Lexin Capital, filed the plans. The architect is Hill West Architects.
The schedule of occupancy as of this article’s publication date does not show the new uses on floors 1 to 12, so no new uses are not presented in the table below for those floors. The new plans call for 3,941 square feet of commercial use and 203,259 square feet of residential use.

Lexin Capital acquired the building in 2014.

229 West 28th Street

The property

The office building in Chelsea has 156,500 square feet of built space according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has frontage of 124 feet and is 98 feet deep with a total lot size of 12,135 square feet. The lot is irregular. The zoning is M1-6D which allows for up to 10 times floor area ratio (FAR) for manufacturing. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $43.6 million.

Violations and lawsuits

According to city public data, the property has received $350 in OATH penalties in the last year.

There were no lawsuits or bankruptcies filed against the property for the past 24 months.

The neighborhood

In Chelsea, The bulk, or 35 percent of the 52.5 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 8th highest sale turnover among other neighborhoods in the city with $1.4 billion in sales volume in the last two years. For development, Chelsea has near average amount of major developments among other neighborhoods and is the 12th highest in Manhattan. It had 3.3 million square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 6 percent of the neighborhood’s built space.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of 10 of the 21 commercial properties representing 1,261,874 square feet of the 1,660,370 square feet. The largest owner is Buchbinder & Warren, followed by Capstone Equities and then Edison Properties. On the tax block, there were four new building construction projects totaling 880,958 square feet. The largest is a 480-unit, 351,185 square-foot residential (R-2) building submitted by MAG Partners and filed by Susi Yu with plans filed September 16, 2019 and permitted May 18, 2021. The second largest is a 112-unit, 228,989 square-foot residential (R-2) building submitted by HAP Investments and filed by Lawrence Gerstein with plans filed September 8, 2016 and permitted May 15, 2019.

The owner

The PincusCo database currently indicates that Lexin Capital owned at least three commercial properties in New York City with 355,492 square feet and a city-determined market value of $123.1 million. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) The portfolio has $125 million in debt, borrowed from Deutsche Pfandbriefbank and Metropolitan Commercial Bank. Within the portfolio, the bulk, or 79 percent of the 355,492 square feet of built space are office properties, with hotel properties next occupying 21 percent of the space. They are all located in Manhattan.

The surrounding

Within a 400-foot radius of 239 West 28 Street, PincusCo identified eight commercial real estate items of interests occurred over the past 24 months. Of those eight items, three were sales above $5 million totaling $147.2 million. The most recent of the three was Capstone Equities which bought the 87,620-square-foot, 13-unit office building (O6) on 322-326 7th Avenue for $80.8 million from Corem Property Group on November 24, 2025. Of those eight items, five were loans above $5 million totaling $179.6 million. The most recent of the five was Capstone Equities in which borrowed $58.5 million from Prosperity Life Group secured by the 87,620-square-foot, 13-unit office building (O6) on 322-326 7th Avenue on November 24, 2025.

Direct link to the property’s ACRIS page and link to DOB NOW portal.