RFR, Waterfall acquire UWS retail condo from Vanbarton through $38.7M deed-in-lieu

RFR Holding and Waterfall Asset Management through the entity Astor Retail Condominium LLC acquired the retail condominium unit at the Astor at 235 West 75th Street on the Upper West Side, Manhattan at a transfer price of $38.7 million from Vanbarton Group’s Astor Retail Strategic Venture LLC in a deed-in-lieu transaction.
The deal closed on March 15, 2023 and was recorded on March 23, 2023. The property has 28,892 square feet of built space according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per built square foot is $1,339 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 June 28, 2016, for $103.5 million.
Real Estate Weekly reported on the transfer, that Waterfall took ownership of the property via a deed-in-lieu of foreclosure and RFR bought into the partnership.

The signatory for Waterfall was Kenneth Nick, and for Vanbarton Group was Justin Kleinman.

The property

The parcel has a total lot size of 28,892 square feet. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $19 million. The most recent loan totaled $39.3 million and was provided by JPMorgan Chase on July 31, 2019.

Development

There are no active new building construction projects or major alteration projects with initial costs more than $1 million on this tax lot. On the tax lot, the most recent condominium plan was filed by HFZ 235 WEST 75TH STREET OWNER LLC to create 199 residential units and 1 commercial units in a building at 235 West 75th Street in Upper West Side, Manhattan, called 235 West 75th Street Condominium that has a $401.8 million sellout, according to an November 13, 2013 submission to the New York State Attorney General. The principal of the sponsor, HFZ 235 WEST 75TH STREET OWNER LLC, was Ziel Feldman.

The neighborhood

In Upper West Side, The majority, or 59 percent of the 53 million square feet of commercial built space are elevator buildings, with walkup buildings next occupying 23 percent of the space. In sales, Upper West Side has the 7th highest sale turnover among other neighborhoods in the city with $2.2 billion in sales volume in the last two years. For development, Upper West Side has 2.8 times the average amount of major developments relative to other neighborhoods and is the 10th highest in Manhattan. It had 2.9 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.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of seven of the 12 commercial properties representing 232,523 square feet of the 314,727 square feet. The largest owner is Vanbarton Group, followed by Brusco Group and then Ditmas Management Corp..
There are no active new building construction projects on this tax block.

The majority, or 46 percent of the 253,836 square feet of built space are elevator buildings, with hotel buildings next occupying 32 percent of the space.

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