NEW YORK CITY—The new partnership between Alchemy Properties and ABR Investment Partners has wasted no time getting to its first deal. The pair of investors—known as Alchemy-ABR—has acquired the leasehold interest in 211 E. 43rd St., in a joint venture with Clarion Partners. The buyers of the Midtown East office building, which features 211,000 square feet, declined to reveal the price of their purchase but they reportedly paid $99 million, according to the Real Deal.
The seller, Meadow Partners, was represented by a Fried Frank team led by real estate partners Janice Mac Avoy, Jonathan Mechanic and Ross Silver. It was unclear at press time who represented the buyers.
Meadow paid $61 million for the leasehold interest in the building back in 2013, the Real Deal reports. At that time, the property had 125 office tenants and was 90%. The investment firm undertook an approximately $7 million renovation and vacated most of the building. Roughly 60 tenants left but 20 new tenants have signed leases. The building is now 65% occupied, with the largest tenant being Rennert International, a language school.
During the course of the re-tenanting, Meadow also raised average rents — from the low $30s per square foot to over $50 per square foot, the Deal continues. The estate of Sol Goldman will continue to own the underlying land. Ownership has retained Avison Young as the building's exclusive leasing agent and property manager.
The new owners plan to complete a full repositioning of the asset, including an overhaul of the 43rd Street lower façade, upgrading the fire and life safety systems, and implementing an ambitious tenant-friendly turn-key, pre-built space program. Through this strategy, the new owners will provide full and half-floor offerings to the most robust tenant size requirement in the market ranging from 3,000 to 11,000 square feet.
“We are very excited to announce our first acquisition under the new Alchemy-ABR Investment Partners platform,” says Alchemy-ABR's managing partner Brian Ray. “211 E. 43rd St. represents an excellent opportunity to purchase a Midtown Manhattan office building at an attractive basis, just blocks from Grand Central Terminal and the United Nations, providing significant upside in leasing the remaining vacancy.”
Adds Joel Breitkopf, Alchemy-ABR principal, “We are thrilled to be joint venturing with Clarion Partners. They bring tremendous value and insight to our repositioning strategy and we are collectively eager to implement our vision while enhancing the property's value for our investors.”
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Rayna Katz
Rayna Katz is a seasoned business journalist whose extensive experience includes coverage of the lodging sector, travel and the culinary space. She was most recently content director for a business-to-business publisher, overseeing four publications. While at Meeting News, a travel trade publication, she received a Best Reporting award for a story on meeting cancellations in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina.
