Yehuda Kohn pays $2.5M for church in Williamsburg to convert to 10-unit residential

Yehuda Kohn through the entity 193 Graham LLC paid $2.5 million to Iglesia Cristina Pentecostal Getsemani for the church building (M9) at 193 Graham Avenue in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. The expected use is conversion/addition.

On the lot, there is one active major alteration construction project, B01150169, for a 10-unit, 8,419 square-foot residential (R-2) building. The project was submitted by Yehuda Kohn and filed by Yehuda Kohn with plans filed December 24, 2024 and it has not been permitted yet.
The deal closed on January 29, 2025 and was recorded on February 12, 2025. The property has 4,650 square feet of built space and 1,176 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 5,832 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per built square foot is $537 and the price per buildable square foot is $428 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 Iglesia Cristina Pentecostal Getsemani was Julio Mercado. The signatory for Yehuda Kohn was Mary T. Dempsey . The contract date was February 29, 2024.

Prior sales and revenue

Prior to this transaction, PincusCo has records that the buyer Yehuda Kohn purchased four properties in four transactions for a total of $9.3 million and has no record it sold any properties over the past 24 months.
The seller Iglesia Cristina Pentecostal Getsemani had not purchased any other properties and had not sold any properties over the same time period.

The property

The specialty building with 2 residential units in Williamsburg has 4,650 square feet of built space and 1,176 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 5,832 square feet according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has frontage of 25 feet and is 96 feet deep with a total lot size of 2,400 square feet. The zoning is R6 which allows for up to 2.43 times floor area ratio (FAR) for residential. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $307,000.

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 not received any significant violations in the last year.

The neighborhood

In Williamsburg, The bulk, or 39 percent of the 50.4 million square feet of commercial built space are elevator buildings, with walkup buildings next occupying 25 percent of the space. In sales, Williamsburg has the 5th highest sale turnover among other neighborhoods in the city with $2 billion in sales volume in the last two years. For development, Williamsburg is the 10th most active neighborhood among other neighborhoods. It had 4.3 million square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 8 percent of the neighborhood’s built space. There was one pre-foreclosure suit filed among other specialty buildings in the past 12 months.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of six of the 17 commercial properties representing 45,394 square feet of the 90,583 square feet. The largest owner is Eli Kaufman, followed by Lazer Nussenzweig and then Dror Markovich.
There are no active new building construction projects on this tax block.

The majority, or 53 percent of the 90,583 square feet of built space are walkup buildings, with mixed-use buildings next occupying 47 percent of the space.

The buyer

The PincusCo database currently indicates that Yehuda Kohn owned at least 15 commercial properties with 112 residential units in New York City with 60,899 square feet and a city-determined market value of $16.6 million. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) The portfolio has $10 million in debt, borrowed from Broadview Capital. Within the portfolio, the bulk, or 68 percent of the 60,899 square feet of built space are walkup properties, with mixed-use properties next occupying 16 percent of the space. They are all located in Brooklyn.

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