Pinches Abowitz pays $4.3M for dev site in Jamaica

Pinches Abowitz through the entity Tower 162 LLC paid $4.3 million to the entity Sor-San Realty Corp. for the development site at 8961 162nd Street in Jamaica, Queens. The expected use is ground up development.
On the lot, there is one active new building construction project, Q01150733, for a 89-unit, 61,415 square-foot R-2 building. The project was submitted by Emeric Weinstock and filed by Ami Weinstock with plans filed January 16, 2025 and it has not been permitted yet.
The deal closed on February 26, 2025 and was recorded on March 5, 2025. The property has 13,005 square feet of built space and 38,596 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 51,600 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per built square foot is $334 and the price per buildable square foot is $84 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 Lisa Holden was David Lachtman. The signatory for Pinches Abowitz was Pinches Abowitz. The contract date was July 30, 2024. Pinches Abowitz is identified as manager in loan documents. The transfer document gives the contract date as 7/30/2025, which is impossible since that’s after the closing date. PincusCo has made the assumption it should be 7/30/2024. Carlo Santore, a relative of the seller Lisa Holden, bought the property in 2000.

Prior sales and revenue

Prior to this transaction, PincusCo has records that the buyer Pinches Abowitz purchased one property in one transaction for a total of $4.8 million and has no record it sold any properties over the past 24 months.
The seller Lisa Holden had not purchased any other properties and had not sold any properties over the same time period. The 13,005-square-foot property generated revenue of $428,255 or $33 per square foot, according to the most recent income and expense figures.

The property

The mixed-use building in Jamaica has 13,005 square feet of built space and 38,596 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 51,600 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has frontage of 80 feet and is 129 feet deep with a total lot size of 10,320 square feet. The zoning is C4-5X which allows for up to 4 times floor area ratio (FAR) for commercial and up to 5 times FAR for residential with inclusionary housing. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $1.9 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 not received any significant violations in the last year.

The neighborhood

In Jamaica, The bulk, or 34 percent of the 29.2 million square feet of commercial built space are elevator buildings, with specialty buildings next occupying 14 percent of the space. In sales, Jamaica has 1.2 times the average sales volume among other neighborhoods with $323 million in sales volume in the last two years and is the 5th highest in Queens. For development, Jamaica has 1.2 times the average amount of major developments relative to other neighborhoods and is the 5th highest in Queens. It had 1.4 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. There was one pre-foreclosure suit filed among other mixed-use buildings in the past 12 months.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of six of the 16 commercial properties representing 310,862 square feet of the 543,415 square feet. The largest owner is Jackson Group, followed by Maor Rosilio and then New York City Housing Authority.
On the tax block, there were two new building construction projects totaling 111,537 square feet. The largest is a 89-unit, 61,415 square-foot residential (R-2) building submitted by Emeric Weinstock and filed by Ami Weinstock with plans filed January 16, 2025 and it has not been permitted yet. The second largest is a 52-unit, 50,122 square-foot residential (R-2) building submitted by Windfall Group and filed by Eddie Ni with plans filed April 21, 2022 and permitted June 2, 2022.

The majority, or 32 percent of the 543,415 square feet of built space are elevator buildings, with industrial buildings next occupying 29 percent of the space.

The buyer

The PincusCo database currently indicates that Pinches Abowitz owned at least seven commercial properties with 129 residential units in New York City with 14,904 square feet and a city-determined market value of $3.7 million. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) The portfolio has $58.5 million in debt, with top three lenders as S3 Capital, Popular Bank, and Webster Bank respectively. Within the portfolio, the bulk, or 92 percent of the 14,904 square feet of built space are retail properties, with A5 properties next occupying 8 percent of the space. The bulk, or 92 percent of the built space, is in Brooklyn, with Bronx next at 8 percent of the space.

Direct link to Acris document. link