Poise Property pays $7.2M for stalled Greenpoint project formerly owned by Xi Hui Wu, Chaim Miller

Poise Property Group, led by Val Katayev and Daniel Kaykov through the entity 55 Eckford St LLC paid $7.2 million at a foreclosure auction for the stalled 26-unit project at 55 Eckford Street in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. The former owners were Xi Hui Wu and Chaim Miller, according to property and court records.

A prior owner, David Schwartz of 55 Eckford Street, Brooklyn LLC, submitted a new building construction project for a 27-unit, 24,224 square-foot residential (R-2) building at 55 Eckford Street in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. The plan was filed with the New York City Department of Buildings on December 4, 2003 under job number 301675319 and was permitted on March 7, 2006. It calls for the construction of a 10-story building.

The deal closed on April 24, 2024 and was recorded on April 25, 2024. The property has 42,449 square feet of planned space according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per planned square foot is $170 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 seller bought the property on December 28, 2012, for $6.75 million. The signatory for the auction was referee Helmut Borchet. The signatory for Poise Property Group was Daniel Kaykov. The contract date was September 21, 2023.

Xi Hui Wu was the guarantor for the 2014 loans from Confidential Lending LLC and Chaim Miller “executed” and signed loans. . After buying the property, the owner entity borrowed $7.5 million from a private lender, Confidential Lending LLC, in January 2014. Then in 2018 Confidential Lending filed a pre-foreclosure action, 522669/2018. The total due according to the summary of the sale was $7.99 million to the lender and $3.9 million in real estate taxes, leaving a deficiency of $4.9 million following the sale.

Prior sales and revenue

Prior to this transaction, PincusCo has no record that the buyer Poise Property Group had purchased any other properties and has no record it sold any properties over the past 24 months.
The seller Xi Hui Wu had not purchased any other properties and had not sold any properties over the same time period.

The property

The parcel has frontage of 97 feet and is 100 feet deep with a total lot size of 10,375 square feet. The lot is irregular. The zoning is M1-2/R6B which allows for up to 2 times floor area ratio (FAR) for manufacturing and up to 2 times FAR for residential with inclusionary housing. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $1.4 million.

Violations and lawsuits

The property was involved in one lawsuit and one bankruptcy over the past two years. The suit was a $700,000 money judgment concerning a deposit filed on August 2, 2023, by Elizabeth McDonald against Eric Pang and Victor Tsai. The bankruptcy was filed on November 14, 2023, by Sam Sprei, a frequent partner with Chaim Miller. In addition, according to city public data, the property has received five DOB violations, $7,500 in ECB penalties, and $7,550 in OATH penalties in the last year.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of eight of the 14 commercial properties representing 73,503 square feet of the 136,670 square feet. The largest owner is Tin See Fung, followed by Graph Group and then Edward Zylka.
On the tax block, there were two new building construction projects totaling 40,505 square feet. The largest is a 24-unit, 20,276 square-foot residential (R-2) building submitted by Abe Posner with plans filed April 5, 2022 and permitted January 17, 2023. The second largest is a 70-unit, 20,229 square-foot hotel/dormitory/shelter (R-1) building submitted by Joel Goldman with plans filed May 12, 2015 and permitted June 21, 2017.

The majority, or 31 percent of the 136,670 square feet of built space are elevator buildings, with walkup buildings next occupying 29 percent of the space.

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