Wharton Properties buys $3.75M note secured by its retail in Jamaica

Jeff Sutton’s Wharton Properties through the entity J&M Lender I LLC bought a note with an original principal of $3.75 million from Blackstone Group and Rialto Management Group secured by Wharton Properties’s retail building (K4) at 166-19 Jamaica Avenue in Jamaica, Queens.
The deal closed on June 6, 2025 and was recorded on June 17, 2025. The property has 2,000 square feet of built space and 10,040 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 12,040 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data.
The owner bought the property on May 31, 2006, for $1.6 million. The signatory for Wharton Properties for the 2017 loan originated by Signature Bank was Jeff Sutton .

Prior sales and revenue

The 2,000-square-foot property generated revenue of $206,640 or $103 per square foot, according to the most recent income and expense figures.

The property

The retail building in Jamaica has 2,000 square feet of built space and 10,040 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 12,040 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has frontage of 20 feet and is 100 feet deep with a total lot size of 2,000 square feet. The zoning is C6-2 which allows for up to 6 times floor area ratio (FAR) for commercial and up to 6.02 times FAR for residential. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $1.2 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 $430 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 Jamaica, The bulk, or 34 percent of the 29.2 million square feet of commercial built space are elevator buildings, with specialty buildings next occupying 14 percent of the space. In sales, Jamaica has near average sales volume among other neighborhoods with $279.2 million in sales volume in the last two years and is the 6th highest in Queens. For development, Jamaica has 1.2 times the average amount of major developments relative to other neighborhoods and is the 5th highest in Queens. It had 1.5 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. There was one pre-foreclosure suit filed among other retail buildings in the past 12 months.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of three of the 17 commercial properties representing 714,849 square feet of the 857,880 square feet. The largest owner is St. Nicks Alliance, followed by Wharton Properties and then Simranjeet Singh.
On the tax block, there were two new building construction projects totaling 505,485 square feet. The largest is a 614-unit, 492,987 square-foot residential (R-2) building submitted by BRP Companies and filed by Mary Serafy with plans filed August 17, 2020 and permitted April 26, 2022. The second largest is a 17-unit, 12,498 square-foot residential (R-2) building submitted by Simranjeet Singh with plans filed August 9, 2021 and permitted November 22, 2024.

The majority, or 83 percent of the 857,880 square feet of built space are elevator buildings, with retail buildings next occupying 13 percent of the space.

The borrower

The PincusCo database currently indicates that Wharton Properties owned at least 86 commercial properties with 204 residential units in New York City with 3,291,819 square feet and a city-determined market value of $1.7 billion. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) The portfolio has $263.8 million in debt, with top three lenders as Valley National Bank, Bank of China, and Provident Bank respectively. Within the portfolio, the bulk, or 68 percent of the 3,291,819 square feet of built space are office properties, with retail properties next occupying 20 percent of the space. The bulk, or 86 percent of the built space, is in Manhattan, with Brooklyn next at 10 percent of the space.

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