Billionaire Leon Black buying Christian Candy’s $50M home

London developer bought the former Knoedler Gallery on East 70th Street for $35M last year

From left 19 East 70th Street, Leon and Debra Black
From left 19 East 70th Street, Leon and Debra Black

Private equity fund giant Leon Black and his wife Debra are buying an Upper East Side townhouse for $50 million.

Black and his wife, Who Is A Broadway producer as well as co-founder and chairman of the board at the Melanoma Research Alliance, are reportedly buying the former Knoedler & Company art gallery, which closed after a scandal in 2009.

Sign Up for the undefined Newsletter

The 17,000-square-foot Italian Renaissance-style home at 19 East 70th Street last traded hands when London developer Christian Candy bought it for $35 million in 2013. Even though Candy got the permits to renovate the house, he put it back on the market for $55 million earlier this year.

The 104-year-old building is said to be in need of more than $20 million worth of renovations. Black, a leveraged buyout specialist, co-founded M&A firm Apollo Global Management in 1990. [NYP, 1st] — Claire Moses