Ozone Park shopping center sells for $14.7M

New Jersey investors John and Peter Tal through the entities 20 Camillus, LLC and Rome Gas Inc., bought a 31,000-square-foot Ozone Park, Queens, shopping center at 137-20 Cross Bay Boulevard for $14.7 million in a deal that closed on February 21, 2025, and has not been recorded as of publication, according to sources familiar with the transaction.

The sale price per built square foot was $474 per square foot.
The prior owners were Slope Realty’s Shmuel Goldstein and minority owner and manager Wasa Properties. The owners bought the property in 2007 for $15 million, and most recently borrowed $9 million from TD Bank on March 30, 2020.
The buyers financed the acquisition with an $8.1 million loan from JPMorgan Chase.

The property is fully leased to tenants including Dollar Tree, Panera Bread and UPS, according to marketing material, 137-20 Cross Bay Blvd Public OM 2025.

Schuckman Realty’s Baruch Edelkopf and Matthew Colantonio brokered the sale transaction, while Fortune Capital Group’s Jake Gluck and Michael Helmreich brokered the loan transaction.

This is not the first retail purchase for the buyers. John and Peter Tal, through the entity Rome Gas Inc., bought the retail property 54-05 99th Street in Corona, Queens, in February 2021, for $3.75 million, Traded NY reported at the time.

Wasa Properties, according to its website, is led by founding principals Morty and Shlomo Bistritzky, and owns properties in New York, New Jersey, North Carolina and Florida. It is looking to purchase in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Texas, the site says.

The former owner submitted a major alteration plan for the building on February 23, 2023 under job number Q00826816 which was permitted on May 23, 2023. The project was described in the filing as: Alt-CO [alteration to the certificate of occupation] filed for interior renovation of partial first floor and to demise existing commercial retail store into two (2) separate commercial units, work to include facade work as per plans filed herewith. In December 2023, Wasa Properties announced Panera Bread had opened in the shopping center.

The property

The retail building in Ozone Park has 31,000 square feet of built space and 85,709 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 116,612 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has two buildings with frontage of 527 feet and is 207 feet deep with a total lot size of 58,306 square feet. The lot is irregular. The zoning is R5D which allows for up to 2 times floor area ratio (FAR) for residential. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $9.2 million. The most recent loan totaled $9 million and was provided by TD Bank on March 30, 2020.

Prior sales and revenue

Prior to this transaction the property was sold for $15 million on July 24, 2007.

The 31,000-square-foot property generated revenue of $1.6 million or $52 per square foot, according to the most recent income and expense figures.

Violations and lawsuits

According to city public data, the property has received $3,000 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 Ozone Park, The bulk, or 28 percent of the 5.4 million square feet of commercial built space are mixed-use buildings, with industrial buildings next occupying 22 percent of the space. In sales, Ozone Park has near average sales volume among other neighborhoods with $82.5 million in sales volume in the last two years and is the 20th highest in Queens. For development, Ozone Park has near average amount of major developments among other neighborhoods and is the 31st highest in Queens. It had 123,264 square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 2 percent of the neighborhood’s built space.

The block

On the tax block, there was one new building construction project filed totaling 1,890 square feet. It is a two-unit, 1,890 square-foot residential (R-3) building submitted by Inderpal Singh with plans filed April 17, 2017 and permitted October 24, 2017.

The surrounding

This is the first commercial real estate event of interest identified within the 400-foot radius of 90-29 Albert Road in the past 24 months.

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