From left: Steven Roth, Stephen Ross, Darcy Stacom, Marc Holliday and Norman Sturner

From the July issue: These days — with credit tight and lawsuits sprouting like weeds — no real estate transaction is simple. Whether it’s a one-bedroom condo or a distressed office building, sales are often slower and more complicated than expected.
That said, some deals have so much “hair” on them that they deserve special recognition. This month, The Real Deal took a behind-the-scenes look at some of the most complicated deals in the last year. These include some of the city’s highest-profile transactions, such as Google’s $1.77 billion purchase of the Chelsea office building at 111 Eighth Avenue. The building’s owners were able to lure the technology behemoth into an all-cash deal, but only after they spent a nerve-racking two weeks — during which the property was not actively marketed — waiting for Google’s top brass to approve the record-setting sale.

[more]

Google isn’t wasting any time in its plan to gobble up additional office space at 111 Eighth Avenue, the mammoth Chelsea office building that it purchased for $1.8 billion late last year. According to a Real Estate Weekly source, the search engine giant has already made a buyout offer of an undisclosed sum for Nike’s 100,000 square feet of sixth-floor space at the 3 million-square-foot property, which was declined. Nike’s lease expires in 2014, but Google apparently wants to expand more quickly than that. The source said Nike rejected the offer because it’s currently paying less than market-rate and doesn’t want to move early. [REW]

Big lenders are back — kind of, according to Crain’s, with several high-profile commercial loans coming through in recent months. The Bank of China’s $800 million loan for a refinancing at 245 Park Avenue and Bank of America’s $500 million Google loan at 111 Eighth Avenue are among the headline-grabbing deals that have commercial real estaters feeling optimistic. Joseph DePaolo, chief executive of Manhattan-based Signature Bank, said that while some lenders are still reluctant to get into the commercial and industrial markets, multi-family loans and refinancings are plentiful. [more]

Jamestown Properties is buying out its partners in the Chelsea Market for more than $225 million and planning to add a 300,000-square-foot tower atop the retail and office hotspot, which takes up the block between 10th and 11th avenues and 15th and 16th streets. According to the Wall Street Journal, the deal, with Angelo, Gordon & Co., Belvedere Capital and original Chelsea Market developer Irwin Cohen, values the property at around $800 million. Cohen paid less than $10 million for the former run-down industrial building in the early 1990s. [more]

The flip may be staging a comeback in some choice New York City neighborhoods, but overall, commercial property values are still falling across the five boroughs, even as sales activity has begun to thaw. On a per-square-foot basis, commercial properties traded at 8.4 percent below their 2009 prices last year, according to year-end sales figures released today by Massey Knakal Realty Services. The firm tracks citywide sales of all property types, including multi-family, industrial, office, hotel and development sites. Comments

• Tweet

For New York City real estate, 2010 in many ways marked a return to normalcy after the tumultuous aftermath of the financial crisis. As the ubiquitous real estate appraiser and Miller Samuel CEO Jonathan Miller put it: “it was a year of a sense of relief.” City home prices stopped their freefall and sales activity improved considerably from the post-Lehman doldrums. Stalled condominium projects like the Sheffield and 1 Rector Park re-started sales. Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim bought Tamir Sapir’s Fifth Avenue townhouse, the Duke Semans mansion, for $44 million. As the unspoken taboo on ostentatious spending faded, a number of high-end residential properties changed hands at the end of the year, including Brooke Astor’s 14-room duplex at 778 Park Avenue, which finally sold after two years on the market (albeit for a significant discount from its original asking price). Japanese retailer Uniqlo snagged 89,000 square feet at 666 Fifth Avenue’s former Brooks Brothers space for a record $300 million, demonstrating that retail is still thriving along the posh shopping corridor.
But the economic downturn continued to make its presence felt. The office market remained uneven and troubled lender iStar Financial fought to stave off bankruptcy amid lingering fears of a double-dip recession.
Here are The Real Deal staff’s picks for the stories that most altered the New York City real estate landscape in 2010, in alphabetical order. [more]

Google has closed on 111 Eighth Avenue, according to sellers Taconic Investment Partners and Jamestown Properties. Although the sellers declined to comment on the closing price, a source with knowledge of the deal told The Real Deal that the previously reported figure of $1.77 billion was accurate. Google paid all-cash for the 2.9 million-square-foot Chelsea building, located between 15th and 16th streets, where it will occupy about 550,000 square feet. TRD

From left: Eastdil’s Doug Harmon, CB Richard Ellis’ Darcy Stacom, Steve Siegel, Bill Shanahan and the building at 111 Eighth Avenue (building photo source: PropertyShark)

Google is reportedly shelling out $1.77 billion in cash for its new office at 111 Eighth Avenue, which was reported as sold earlier this month, according to the New York Post. Google will occupy 550,000 square feet in the 2.9 million-square-foot Chelsea building, located between 15th and 16th streets. Douglas Harmon of Eastdil Securities marketed the building, which reportedly had numerous competing buyers. But, according to Dan Fasulo of commercial real estate tracking firm Real Capital Analytics, Google’s ability to pay cash helped it succeed in the purchase. [more]

Google signed a contract yesterday to buy its 111 Eighth Avenue New York City home for $1.8 billion in the largest commercial real estate purchase by a tenant in U.S. history, according to the Post. The company put down “serious money,” though not a full 10 percent deposit, accordng to sources. Google currently has 500,000 square feet of the 3 million-square-foot property between 15th and 16th streets, where Nike WebMD and Sprint also reside, but is said to be planning to “gobble up the [other current tenants'] space like Pac-Man,” when their leases are up, as one source put it. 1 Comment

• Tweet

Google is nearing a deal to buy its massive 111 Eighth Avenue home — one of the largest buildings in Manhattan — for close to its striking $2 billion asking price, the Post reported. The company currently leases more than 550,000 square feet in the 18-story Chelsea trophy and has already made known its plans to expand in New York City. The former industrial property, whose tenants now also include Nike, WebMD and Sprint, contains 2.9 million square feet of space, putting the rumored price tag at around $690 per square foot. But unsurprisingly, Google isn’t the only one angling for control of the asset, which Taconic Partners, Jamestown and the New York State Common Retirement Fund put on the market last month with Douglas Harmon of Eastdil Secured. Local families, real estate investment trusts, sovereign wealth funds from the Middle East and Asia as well as entities from Beijing, Singapore, Chile, Argentina and Israel are among the others said to be interesting in bidding on the property. [Post]

[more]