Extell beefs up Third Avenue acquisitions

From left: Yorkville area in the UES and Gary Barnett
From left: Yorkville area in the UES and Gary Barnett

Gary Barnett’s Extell Development has expanded its holdings on a stretch of the Upper East Side, paying $8.63 million for a mixed-use building at 1685 Third Avenue to landlord Ogrin Associates, on the same day that Extell sold Ogrin a property at 1570 Second Avenue for less than half the purchase price, city records show. The deal appears to be part of a larger move by Extell to acquire, and possibly develop, the stretch of Third Avenue between East 94th and East 95th streets.

The 6,648-square-foot residential and retail property was built in 1920. It lies on a 2,516-square-foot lot in a residential zone that allows for the highest density residential development in the city, a Department of City Planning spokesperson previously told The Real Deal.

The deal closed Feb. 1, records show.

Barnett, who is behind the megaproject One57, has more Manhattan developments in the pipeline than any other developer, and has been assembling a site at 1687-1693 Third Avenue, which is on the same block as 1685 Third Avenue.

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In December, Extell also purchased the adjacent mixed-use building at 1683 Third Avenue, as The Real Deal previously reported. As part of the deal, Extell paid $7.7 million for 1681 Third Avenue, as well as 37,752 square feet of air rights from that property.

The deal may shed some light on a Jan. 31 sale of an Extell-owned property at 1570 Second Avenue to Ogrin for $4 million, less than half of the $9.47 million Extell paid in 2007 for the four-story, 6,840-square-foot mixed-use building, located between East 81st and East 82nd.

Ogrin was founded in 2004 by the family of the late Leslie Ogrin of Sand Realty. Bibi Sukhraj, an associate at Ogrin, said she was unfamiliar with the details of the transaction. Calls to Extell were not immediately returned.