Summit, Savanna pay $41.7M to Westbrook for office, retail in Midtown East

Summit Properties and Savanna through the entity 444 Madison Ave, LLC paid $41.7 million to Westbrook Partners through the entity VII 444 Madison Lessee LLC for the office building (O4) at 444 Madison Avenue in Midtown East, Manhattan and retail building (K2) at 19 East 49th Street in Midtown East, Manhattan. The expected use is cash flowing.
This is the purchase of a ground lease, not the fee. The fee is owned by Digby Management, which holds the assets of the late real estate developer Leonard Kandell.
The deal closed on September 19, 2025 and was recorded on October 6, 2025. The two properties have 409,186 square feet of built space and 17,641 square feet of additional air rights according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per built square foot is $101 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 Westbrook Partners was Diego Rico . The signatory for Savanna Summit Properties was Tomer Pomeranz .

The Real Deal first reported on the transaction when it was in contract.

Westbrook Partners paid a total of $313.75 million in 2007 for the ground lease and a separate leasehold, borrowing $120 million at the time. That loan fell into default and through a short sale, Summit and Savanna acquired the ground lease, The Real Deal reported.

Prior sales and revenue

Prior to this transaction, PincusCo has records that the buyer Summit Properties purchased one property in one transaction for a total of $22.1 million and has no record it sold any properties over the past 24 months.
The seller Westbrook Partners had not purchased any other properties and had not sold any properties over the same time period. Out of the two properties, one with a total of 409,186 square feet of built space generated revenue of $1.1 million per year.

The property

The office building in Midtown East has 409,186 square feet of built space and 17,641 square feet of additional air rights according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has frontage of 200 feet and is 95 feet deep with a total lot size of 16,575 square feet. The lot is irregular. The zoning is C5-3 which allows for up to 15 times floor area ratio (FAR) for commercial and up to 10 times FAR for residential with inclusionary housing. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $168.6 million.

Violations and lawsuits

There were no lawsuits or bankruptcies filed against the properties for the past 24 months. In addition, according to city public data, the properties have received $10,000 in ECB penalties and $12,330 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 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 $3.6 billion in sales volume in the last two years. For development, Midtown East is the 3rd most active neighborhood among other neighborhoods. It had 15.9 million square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 25 percent of the neighborhood’s built space. There was one pre-foreclosure suit filed among other office buildings in the past 12 months.

The block

On the tax block of 444 Madison Avenue, PincusCo has identified the owners of three of the six commercial properties representing 1,883,829 square feet of the 1,949,671 square feet. The largest owner is Tishman Speyer, followed by William Kaufman Organization and then Waterman Properties.
There are no active new building construction projects on this tax block.

The majority, or 97 percent of the 1.9 million square feet of built space are office buildings, with retail buildings next occupying 3 percent of the space.

The buyer

The PincusCo database currently indicates that Summit Properties owned at least one commercial property in New York City with 40,197 square feet and a city-determined market value of $12.8 million. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) The portfolio consists of at least a single hotel property. It is located in Manhattan.

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