Omni NY signs $28.6M refi for two elevator properties in Belmont

Omni New York through the entity Twin Parks Apartments, Inc. as borrower signed a refi loan with lender Merchants Bank of Indiana valued at $28.6 million for two residential elevator properties including the 166-unit residential elevator building at 711 Garden Street in Belmont, Bronx and midblock 108-unit residential elevator building at 2260 Crotona Avenue in Belmont, Bronx.
The deal closed on February 24, 2022 and was recorded on March 7, 2022. The prior lender was NYS Housing Finance Agency which still holds debt. The two properties have 298,500 square feet of built space and 16,734 square feet of additional air rights according to PincusCo analysis of city data. The loan price per built square foot is $95 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 Omni New York was Eugene Schneur. The signatory for Merchants Bank of Indiana was Phil Daubenmire.

Because multiple properties have been transacted, some of the following sections will follow the property with the largest assessed value, which in this case, is the property on 711 Garden Street.

Prior sales and revenue

The owners according to the Department of Housing Preservation and Development includes Eugene Schneur, head officer and Patricia Guzman, site manager. The business entities are Reliant Realty Services, Llc and Twin Parks, L.P.

The property

The 711 Garden Street parcel has frontage of 324 feet and is 182 feet deep with a total lot size of 38,559 square feet. The lot is irregular. The zoning is R7-1 which allows for up to 3.44 times floor area ratio (FAR) for residential. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $10.3 million. The property has a city-determined energy rating of 16 out of 100.

Violations and lawsuits

The properties were not involved in any lawsuits or bankruptcies in the past years. In addition, according to city public data, the properties have received two DOB violations, $1,250 in ECB penalties, 85 housing violations, $1,550 in OATH penalties, and five housing litigations in the last year.

Development

There are no active new building construction projects or major alteration projects with initial costs more than $5 million on this tax lot.

The neighborhood

In Belmont/Little Italy, the bulk, or 35 percent of the 17.6 million square feet of built space are residential walkup buildings, with residential elevator buildings next occupying 22 percent of the space. In sales, Belmont/Little Italy has had very little sales volume relative to other neighborhoods with $73 million in sales volume in the last two years. For development, Belmont/Little Italy has had very little major development activity relative to other neighborhoods.It had 643,422 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 the tax block of 711 Garden Street, PincusCo has identified the owners of one of the four commercial properties representing 91,504 square feet of the 381,186 square feet. The identified owner is NYC Department of Education. There are no active new building construction projects on this tax block.

the majority, or 62 percent of the 445,180 square feet of built space are residential elevator buildings, with specialty buildings next occupying 23 percent of the space.

The borrower

The PincusCo database currently indicates that Omni New York owned at least 96 commercial properties with 3,677,247 square feet and a city-determined market value of $351.5 million. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) The portfolio has $389.7 million in debt, with top three lenders as NYC Housing Development Corporation, KeyBank, and Merchants Bank of Indiana respectively. Within the portfolio, the bulk, or 82 percent of the 3,677,247 square feet of built space are residential elevator properties, with residential walkup properties next occupying 15 percent of the space. The bulk, or 58 percent of the built space, is in Bronx, with Brooklyn next at 34 percent of the space.

Surrounding

Within a 400-foot radius of 711 Garden Street, Pincusco identified two commercial real estate items of interests occurred over the past 24 months.
Of those two items, one was in new building development. It was a new building permit application filed on December 21, 2021 for a 23,068-square-foot R-2 building with 34 residential units at 773 Grote Street.
One of those two items was a loan which Omni New York borrowed $6 million from Merchants Bank of Indiana secured by the 48,000-square-foot, 28-unit rental (C1) on 2254 Crotona Avenue and six other properties on March 3, 2022.

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