Ramirez Asset Management pays $19.5M for mixed-use in Midtown East sought by Harry Macklowe

Ramirez Asset Management through the entity RAM HQ, LLC paid $19.5 million to the Spanish investment company Inmoprisa through the entity Inmoprisa USA, Inc. for the mixed-use building (K4) at 14 East 52nd Street in Midtown East, Manhattan.
The deal closed on October 16, 2023 and was recorded on October 17, 2023. The property has 21,776 square feet of built space and 8,381 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 30,150 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per built square foot is $895 and the price per buildable square foot is $646 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 September 18, 2017, for $36 million. The signatory for Inmoprisa was Gloria Cedeño de Hoces of Inmoprisa. The signatory for Ramirez Asset Management was Samuel A. Ramirez Jr., company CEO. The contract date was September 22, 2023.

Tim Ziss of Allied Properties sought to buy the property, and placed his purchasing entity in bankruptcy earlier this year in an effort to preserve that contract, PincusCo reported at the time. The Real Deal reported that Harry Macklowe was behind the latest effort led by Ziss to buy the building.

The former tenant in the building, the wedding gown designer Pronovias, was owned by the billionaire Alberto Palatchi Ribera, who owns Inmoprisa. Alberto Palatchi Ribera is listed as a director of Inmoprisa UK as is Gloria Cedeño de Hoces.

Ramirez Asset Management is an affiliate of Ramirez & Company, Inc., and according to its website, “Ramirez Asset Management (“RAM”) specializes in fixed income and equity asset management and provides investment advisory services to institutional and high net worth investors.”

Prior sales and revenue

Prior to this transaction, PincusCo has no record that the buyer Ramirez Asset Management had purchased any other properties and has no record it sold any properties over the past 24 months.
The seller Inmoprisa had not purchased any other properties and had not sold any properties over the same time period.

The property

The mixed-use building in Midtown East has 21,776 square feet of built space and 8,381 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 30,150 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has frontage of 30 feet and is 100 feet deep with a total lot size of 3,015 square feet. The zoning is C5-2.5 which allows for up to 12 times floor area ratio (FAR) for commercial The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $9.5 million.

Violations and lawsuits

The property was involved in zero lawsuits and one bankruptcy over the past two years. The bankruptcy was filed on April 20, 2023, by Tim Ziss, Allied Properties, and Efthimisios Zisimopoulos citing assets of $22.5 million. In addition, according to city public data, the property has received six DOB violations in the last year.

Development

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 Midtown East, The majority, or 81 percent of the 62.6 million square feet of commercial built space are office buildings, with hotel buildings next occupying 7 percent of the space. In sales, Midtown East has the 2nd highest sale turnover among other neighborhoods in the city with $3.8 billion in sales volume in the last two years. For development, Midtown East is the most active neighborhood among other neighborhoods. It had 19.4 million square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 31 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 eight of the 15 commercial properties representing 1,500,584 square feet of the 2,067,997 square feet. The largest owner is Vornado Realty Trust, followed by Seven Valleys and then Rfr Holding.
There are no active new building construction projects on this tax block.

The majority, or 95 percent of the 2.1 million square feet of built space are office buildings, with mixed-use buildings next occupying 2 percent of the space.

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