Meral Property Group pays $3M for 10-unit dev site in Crown Heights

Meral Property Group through the entity GH Washington LLC paid $3 million to Jerome Walsh through the entity Mayday Hardware And Supply Co., Inc. for the 10-unit development site at 753 Washington Avenue in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. Meral Property Group is an affiliate of BridgeCity Capital.

On the lot, there is one active new building construction project for a 10-unit, 10,303 square-foot R-2 building. The project was submitted by Meral Property Group and filed by Louis Lebovits with plans filed February 21, 2024 and it has not been permitted yet.

The deal closed on June 27, 2024 and was recorded on July 15, 2024. The property has 3,245 square feet of built space and 8,110 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 11,370 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per built square foot is $924 and the price per buildable square foot is $263 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 Jerome Walsh was Jerome Walsh. The signatory for Meral Property Group was Louis Lebovits. The contract date was November 22, 2023. Jerome Walsh is president of Mayday Hardware.

Prior sales and revenue

Prior to this transaction, PincusCo has records that the buyer Meral Property Group purchased three properties in one transaction for a total of $10 million and has no record it sold any properties over the past 24 months.
The seller Jerome Walsh had not purchased any other properties and had not sold any properties over the same time period.

The property

The retail building in Crown Heights has 3,245 square feet of built space and 8,110 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 11,370 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has frontage of 44 feet and is 85 feet deep with a total lot size of 3,790 square feet. The zoning is R6A which allows for up to 3 times floor area ratio (FAR) for residential with inclusionary housing. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $586,000.

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.

The neighborhood

In Crown Heights, The bulk, or 39 percent of the 46.5 million square feet of commercial built space are walkup buildings, with elevator buildings next occupying 36 percent of the space. In sales, Crown Heights has 2.4 times the average sales volume among other neighborhoods with $641.3 million in sales volume in the last two years and is the 7th highest in Brooklyn. For development, Crown Heights has 2.1 times the average amount of major developments relative to other neighborhoods and is the 6th highest in Brooklyn. It had 2.2 million square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 5 percent of the neighborhood’s built space.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of 17 of the 37 commercial properties representing 174,570 square feet of the 240,022 square feet. The largest owner is Watermark Capital Group, followed by Sophia Whitin and then Solomon Schwimmer.
On the tax block, there were three new building construction projects totaling 65,440 square feet. The largest is a 10-unit, 27,613 square-foot residential (R-2) building submitted by Theordore Trachtenberg with plans filed February 22, 2022 and permitted December 14, 2022. The second largest is a 41-unit, 27,524 square-foot residential (R-2) building submitted by Rishona Sender with plans filed December 16, 2015 and it has not been permitted yet.

The majority, or 41 percent of the 240,022 square feet of built space are walkup buildings, with elevator buildings next occupying 33 percent of the space.

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