Yin Chou Hu pays $8.6M to Michael Axelrod and Jeffrey Axelrod for retail in Flushing

Yin Chou Hu through the entity W H Plaza, LLC paid $8.6 million to Michael Axelrod and Jeffrey Axelrod through the entity Axelrod Associates for the midblock retail building at 136-11 38th Avenue in Flushing, Queens.
The deal closed on April 12, 2022 and was recorded on April 30, 2022. The property has 12,493 square feet of built space according to PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per built square foot is $686 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 Michael Axelrod and Jeffrey Axelrod was Michael Axelrod and Jeffrey Axelrod. The signatory for Yin Chou Hu was Yin Chou Hu.

Prior sales and revenue

Prior to this transaction, Pincusco has records that the buyer Yin Chou Hu purchased one properties in one transactions for a total of $10.5 million and has no record it sold any properties over the past 24 months.
The seller Michael Axelrod had not purchased any other properties and had not sold any properties over the same time period.

The property

The 136-11 38th Avenue parcel has frontage of 58 feet and is 86 feet deep with a total lot size of 5,078 square feet. The lot is irregular. The zoning is C4-3 which allows for up to 3.4 times floor area ratio (FAR) for commercial and up to 2.43 times FAR for residential. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $2 million.

Violations and lawsuits

There were no lawsuits or bankruptcies filed against the property since September of 2020. In addition, according to city public data, the property has received one DOB violation in the last year.

Development

For the tax lot building, it received its initial certificate of occupancy on December 11, 2012. There are no active new building construction projects or major alteration projects with initial costs more than $5 million on this tax lot.

The neighborhood

In Flushing, the bulk, or 39 percent of the 78.7 million square feet of commercial built space are residential elevator buildings, with 1-4 family buildings next occupying 29 percent of the space. In sales, Flushing has near average sales volume among other neighborhoods with $312.4 million in sales volume in the last two years and is the 4th highest in Queens. For development, Flushing has 2.9 times the average amount of major developments relative to other neighborhoods and is the 5th highest in Queens. It had 2.6 million square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 3 percent of the neighborhood’s built space.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of eight of the 219 commercial properties representing 345,733 square feet of the 1,190,899 square feet. The largest owner is Abraham Moshel, followed by United American Land and then Solil Management. There are two active new building construction projects totaling 534,141 square feet. The largest is a 148-unit, 404,480-square-foot B building developed by Frederic Sondik with plans filed October 31, 2013 and permitted December 16, 2014. The second largest is a 129,661-square-foot B building developed by Albert Shirian with plans filed June 5, 2020 and it has not been permitted yet.

The majority, or 38 percent of the 318,716 square feet of built space are industrial buildings, with retail buildings next occupying 33 percent of the space.

The buyer

The PincusCo database, which is incomplete, currently indicates that Yin Chou Hu owned at least three commercial properties with 116,773 square feet and a city-determined market value of $11.1 million. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) The portfolio has $28.9 million in debt, borrowed from Cathay Bank and Amerasia Bank. Within the portfolio, the bulk, or 76 percent of the 116,773 square feet of built space are residential elevator properties, with hotel properties next occupying 24 percent of the space. They are all located in Queens.

Surrounding

PincusCo has not identified any commercial real estate items of interest within a 400-foot radius of 136-11 38th Avenue that occurred over the past 24 months.

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