Samco Properties signs $11M initial loan with Apple Bank for office in Chelsea

Samco Properties through the entity 104 West 29th Street LLC as borrower signed a initial loan with lender Apple Bank through the entity Apple Bank valued at $11 million for the office building (O6) at 104 West 29th Street in Chelsea, Manhattan.
The deal closed on May 9, 2024 and was recorded on May 15, 2024. The property has 121,579 square feet of built space according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The loan price per built square foot is $90 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 Samco Properties was Jeffrey D. Smith and Michael Smith.

The property

The office building in Chelsea has 121,579 square feet of built space according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has frontage of 103 feet and is 98 feet deep with a total lot size of 10,234 square feet. The lot is irregular. The zoning is M1-6 which allows for up to 10 times floor area ratio (FAR) for manufacturing. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $19.4 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 received one DOB violation and $2,575 in OATH penalties 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 Chelsea, The bulk, or 36 percent of the 52.4 million square feet of commercial built space are office buildings, with elevator buildings next occupying 28 percent of the space. In sales, Chelsea has the 8th highest sale turnover among other neighborhoods in the city with $1.3 billion in sales volume in the last two years. For development, Chelsea has 1.8 times the average amount of major developments relative to other neighborhoods and is the 17th highest in Manhattan. It had 2 million square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 4 percent of the neighborhood’s built space.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of seven of the 32 commercial properties representing 758,999 square feet of the 1,556,271 square feet. The largest owner is Samco Properties, followed by Lightstone Group and then Lexin Capital.
On the tax block, there were two new building construction projects totaling 142,049 square feet. The largest is a 350-unit, 112,341 square-foot hotel/dormitory/shelter (R-1) building submitted by Lightstone Group and filed by Joseph Teichman with plans filed January 10, 2014 and permitted March 28, 2016. The second largest is a 37-unit, 29,708 square-foot residential (R-2) building submitted by Hasso Gulrajaney with plans filed May 13, 2015 and it has not been permitted yet.

The majority, or 54 percent of the 1.6 million square feet of built space are office buildings, with hotel buildings next occupying 31 percent of the space.

The borrower

The PincusCo database currently indicates that Samco Properties owned at least three commercial properties in New York City with 601,523 square feet and a city-determined market value of $139 million. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) The portfolio has $73.6 million in debt, borrowed from Apple Bank for Savings. Within the portfolio, all identified are office properties. They are all located in Manhattan.

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