NYU pays $69.2M for dormitory in East Village

New York University paid $69.2 million to Sherwood Equities and Arun Bhatia Development Organization through the entity Cooper And 6th Property LLC for the dormitory building (H8) at 35 Cooper Square in East Village, Manhattan. The expected use is owner-occupied. The dormitory building was net leased to Marymount Manhattan College, but that agreement was terminated a month prior to the sale, city records show.
Crain’s reported on the sale yesterday.
The deal closed on August 15, 2024 and was recorded on August 22, 2024. The property has 45,082 square feet of built space according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per built square foot is $1,534 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 sellers bought the property on October 21, 2010, for $8.5 million and developed the building. The signatory for Sherwood Equities and Arun Bhatia Development Organization was Arun Bhatia. The signatory for New York University was Martin S. Dorph. The contract date was June 13, 2024. Bhatia had a $42 million loan from April 2016.

Prior sales and revenue

Prior to this transaction, PincusCo has records that the buyer New York University purchased eight properties in four transactions for a total of $434.7 million and has no record it sold any properties over the past 24 months.
For example, New York University paid Sand Associates $97.5 million for 400 Lafayette Street on April 20, 2023 and it paid JPMorgan Chase $122 million for 3 Metrotech Center on September 14, 2022.
The seller Arun Bhatia Development Organization had not purchased any other properties and sold one property in one transaction for a total of $15.5 million over the same time period. The former owners according to the Department of Housing Preservation and Development includes Arun Bhatia, head officer and Divya Rashad, officer. The business entities are The Andrews Organization and Cooper And 6th Property, Llc.

The property

The hotel building in East Village has 45,082 square feet of built space according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has frontage of 72 feet and is 80 feet deep with a total lot size of 4,836 square feet. The lot is irregular. The zoning is C6-1 which allows for up to 6 times floor area ratio (FAR) for commercial and up to 3.44 times FAR for residential. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $15.9 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 $900 in OATH penalties in the last year.

Development

For the tax lot building, it received its initial certificate of occupancy on July 27, 2015. 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 East Village, The bulk, or 44 percent of the 15.5 million square feet of commercial built space are walkup buildings, with elevator buildings next occupying 20 percent of the space. In sales, East Village has 2 times the average sales volume among other neighborhoods with $534.9 million in sales volume in the last two years and is the 15th highest in Manhattan. For development, East Village has had very little major development activity relative to other neighborhoods.It had 656,653 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 26 of the 33 commercial properties representing 356,906 square feet of the 459,804 square feet. The largest owner is Ironstate Holdings, followed by Madison Realty Capital and then Jonathan Wertenteil.
There are no active new building construction projects on this tax block.

The majority, or 63 percent of the 459,804 square feet of built space are walkup buildings, with hotel buildings next occupying 30 percent of the space.

The buyer

The PincusCo database currently indicates that New York University owned at least 99 commercial properties with 2,914 residential units in New York City with 12,347,829 square feet and a city-determined market value of $2.7 billion. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) Within the portfolio, the bulk, or 45 percent of the 12,347,829 square feet of built space are specialty properties, with hotel properties next occupying 40 percent of the space. The bulk, or 91 percent of the built space, is in Manhattan, with Brooklyn next at 9 percent of the space.

Direct link to Acris document. link