Spotlight: Walkup building sales 2021

By Adam Pincus

The number of walkup building sales and units sold last year nearly doubled the volume in 2020 and almost eclipsed the number in 2018. Last year, buyers traded 1,230 buildings and just over 15,000 units of the total of about 43,000 walkup buildings in the city that have nearly 600,000 units. The total sales consideration was $3.68 billion. (For this analysis, we looked at buildings with the tax class C1, C2, C4, C5, C7 and C9) The 2021 volume represented about 2.5 percent of the total number of units in those tax classes.

That compares with 1,259 buildings with just over 16,000 units sold in 2018 totaling $4.69 billion and 749 buildings and about 8,000 units sold in 2020 totaling $1.95 billion, according to the analysis of PincusCo data.

The top buyer by far was Greenbrook Partners, which has partnered with the Carlyle Group. Greenbrook executed at least 41 transactions last year totaling $167.5 million, most of that in walkup buildings. Another top buyer was an entity called Townhouse Rental II, LLC, which spent $64 million in 18 transactions, nearly all for walkups.

Other active walkup buyers last year included Denali Management which last year purchased at least 31 walkup buildings within acquisitions totaling $175.5 million, and Chestnut Holdings which bought 19 walkup buildings within purchases totaling $184 million in 26 transactions.

Investor Son Dinh Tran bought at least eight walkups within nine transactions totaling $55.4 million, and Conway Capital bought three walkups within eight purchases totaling $38.4 million.