With $110M deal, Taconic bets on Far West Side

The Far West Side  above 50th Street has been somewhat overlooked by investors, but Taconic Investment Partners is betting on its success with the $110 million acquisition of an office building at 619 West 54th Street, the New York Observer reported.  The 326,000-square-foot deal between Taconic and seller KBS Realty Advisors closed yesterday. It was handled by  a sales team at Jones Lang LaSalle, led by Richard Baxter, JLL vice chairman.

“Go all the way up the West Side,” Paul Pariser, Taconic’s co-CEO with Charles Bendit. “Tribeca is fabulous, Hudson Square is great, the Meatpacking District and Chelsea are booming, then there is the High Line and Hudson Yards and north of that there has been tons of residential development.”

Currently, several residential developments are underway or nearing completion in the area. Two Trees is finishing up Mercedes House, on 53rd Street and 11th Avenue, and Taconic is working on a residential rental project  at 525 West 52nd Street.

“We just believe in the area and the growth along the 11th Avenue corridor,” Bendit told the Observer. “It has a growing population of residents nearby and we feel that a building like 619 West 54th Street caters to that change.” [NYO] — Christopher Cameron