CARLE PLACE, N.Y. — Simone Development Cos. has unveiled plans for the repositioning of a 60,000-square-foot industrial property in Carle Place, located on Long Island. Simone Development acquired the vacant light industrial/warehouse property this summer from Ansaco Properties LLC. The building was constructed in 1962 and served as the longtime home of Johnson & Hoffman, a metal stamping operation. Simone will renovate the property to suit a single tenant, adding additional loading docks and developing 2.7 acres of additional paved parking area to accommodate tractor trailer, delivery truck and additional vehicular parking.
NEW YORK CITY — Pennsylvania based self-storage REIT CubeSmart (NYSE: CUBE) has entered into an agreement to acquire a portfolio of eight properties in New York City from locally based developer Storage Deluxe for $540 million. The portfolio totals 780,425 net rentable square feet and consists of properties in Brooklyn, Queens and The Bronx that are already managed by CubeSmart. The deal is expected to close during the fourth quarter. CubeSmart will finance approximately 28 percent ($154.6 million) of the sales price with fixed-rate debt.
NEW YORK CITY — The Home Depot Inc. (NYSE: HD) will open a 120,000-square-foot store at 410 E. 61st St. on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, a deal that represents the largest retail lease executed in the borough in the last several years. The company signed a 20-year lease for a four-story space that is currently occupied by Bed Bath & Beyond, which will vacate the space when its lease expires in 2021. Home Depot will relocate its store at 732 Lexington Avenue to the new space some time over the next few years. Peter Ripka of Ripco Real Estate represented the tenant and the landlord, Gazit-Globe, in the lease negotiations.
WESTBURY, N.Y. — Austin-based Whole Foods Market will open a 57,000-square-foot grocery store at 867 E. Gate Blvd. in the Long Island city of Westbury on Thursday, Nov. 5. The new store will offer a coffee bar with cold brew and iced tea on tap, as well as juice bar with smoothies, a full-service butcher, in-house bakery, prepared foods section and a selection of more than 350 beers. The store will also offer curbside pickup and two-hour delivery for Amazon Prime members in select cities and towns.
NEW YORK CITY — Fisher Bros. has completed the $20 million renovation of 299 Park Avenue in Manhattan. The company partnered with Rockwell Group for the design of the project, which included upgrades to the lobby, elevators and exterior façade, as well as the addition of a digital art display. Fisher Bros. owns the 1.2 million-square-foot building and houses its office headquarters within the property.
NEW YORK CITY — Taconic Partners and Nuveen Real Estate have unveiled plans to redevelop 125 West End Avenue into a life sciences and research building. Broadcaster ABC has occupied the property as part of its New York City headquarters since 1985 but plans to vacate in January 2021. Chrysler originally constructed the eight-story, 400,000-square-foot property in 1929 as an automotive facility. The New York Times is also a former owner and tenant. The building features floorplates of more than 50,000 square feet, ceiling heights ranging from 13 to 16 feet, multiple access points and views of the Hudson River. Taconic and Nuveen purchased the property in late 2019 for $230 million. Plans call for a mechanical plant, purpose-built lab infrastructure, a new façade, roof terrace and conference center. The developers are still evaluating options for the remainder of the site, which includes a six-story, 131,000-square-foot television studio building and a 1.2-acre development parcel. Construction is slated for completion in 2023. The project team includes architect Perkins+Will and engineer JB&B. The development will feature several environmental sustainability features and is on track to achieve LEED Gold certification. Estimated development costs were not disclosed, though LoanCore Capital did provide a $181 …
NEW YORK CITY —Prime Clerk, a division of financial consulting firm Duff & Phelps, has signed a 52,000-square-foot office lease expansion at Liberty Bklyn, a 1.3 million-square-foot industrial and office waterfront redevelopment in Brooklyn. The tenant is expanding from its current 18,940-square-foot space on the fourth floor to an additional and adjacent 11,761-square-foot unit on the same floor and 21,000 square feet on the third floor. Madison Capital and Salmar Properties are the owners of Liberty Bklyn, which is located in Sunset Park and was formerly known as Liberty View Industrial Plaza.
NEW YORK CITY — Blackstone Real Estate Income Trust Inc. (BREIT) has entered into an agreement to acquire Simply Self Storage from an affiliate of Brookfield Asset Management for $1.2 billion. Brookfield acquired Simply Self Storage, whose operating portfolio spans approximately 8 million square feet across the country, in 2016 through one of its funds. The deal is expected to close before the end of the year. Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP is serving as legal advisor to BREIT, and BofA Securities and Deutsche Bank Securities Inc. are serving as financial advisors to BREIT. RBC Capital Markets LLC, Newmark Group Inc. and Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson LLP advised Brookfield. BREIT currently owns a $300 million portfolio of self-storage facilities. Following this acquisition, BREIT will be the third-largest non-listed owner of self-storage in the country. Self-storage, which is typically viewed as a recession-resistant asset class, has seen its rates of absorption and leasing of new units rebound over the summer following a lull in move-in activity that normally occurs in the spring. Self-storage owner-operators expect some of the truncated move-in activity from spring and summer to be offset by the fact that in-person classes at many major universities have …
NEW YORK CITY — The Howard Hughes Corp. (NYSE: HHC) has unveiled plans for a $1.4 billion multifamily project in Manhattan’s Seaport District. The proposal calls for the transformation of a full-block surface parking lot along the boundary of the South Street Seaport Historic District into a mixed-income development that would include some of the area’s first new affordable housing in decades. The development would ultimately feature 360 apartments, about 25 percent of which would be affordable, as well as 260 condominium units. In terms of the multifamily component, the centerpiece is 250 Water Street, where Dallas-based HHC plans to develop at least 100 affordable apartments that would be reserved for households earning 40 percent or less of the area median income. Only 2.5 percent of all housing in the Seaport District qualifies as affordable, and the median household income is more than $150,000. The project would also rehabilitate the historic South Street Seaport Museum, which has faced numerous obstacles over the past two decades, including a two-year closure following 9/11, flooding from Hurricane Sandy in 2012 and an existential threat to attendance from COVID-19. In addition, HHC would develop a new museum building on an adjacent vacant lot. The …
NEW YORK CITY — Centric Brands Inc., which sources, markets and sells apparel for men, women and children, has signed a 212,154-square-foot office lease at the Empire State Building. The space was previously leased to Global Brands Group and occupied by Centric Brands under a sublease. Peter Riguardi, Joseph Messina and Cynthia Wasserberger of JLL represented Centric Brands in the lease negotiations. Anthony Malkin, Ryan Kass and Shanae Ursini represented the landlord, Empire State Realty Trust, on an internal basis.