Aby Rosen’s RFR Holding is looking to unload a 49 percent stake in the landmark Seagram Building at more than $2,000 per square foot. According to the Post, the record price per square foot for an office building was set at $1,585 in 2007 with the sale of 450 Park Avenue, and while prices have rebounded somewhat since the real estate crash, such a price is untested in today’s market. “If you want to test the strength of the market, it’s certainly the building with which to do it,” said Woody Heller, head of capital transactions group at Studley, which is not marketing the building. [more]

From left: Steve Coutts, 499 Park Avenue (source: PropertyShark), 450 Park Avenue (source: PropertyShark), 1114 Sixth Avenue

Downtown landlords who inked major leases in Class A buildings last year made
practically no money on those deals once basic expenses were subtracted, a
recent report from commercial advisory firm Studley shows.
Office building owners of Class A towers earned an average of just $0.53 per
square foot on the approximately 15 large leases inked in 2010, once taxes,
operating expenses, electricity and concessions were accounted for.
That is down from the peak of $28.93 per square foot in 2007, and it was the
lowest landlord effective rent recorded since Studley began conducting the
survey in 1995. In it, they review the lease figures from direct, full-floor lease
deals in Class A buildings that have a term of at least 10 years. The survey
looked at deals in buildings such as 88 Pine Street, 7 World Trade Center and 77
Water Street, brokered by a variety of firms. [more]

It must have been a very bad dream, which lasted the entire year. Yet
it actually happened: little or no activity took place in commercial
real estate in 2009. For those investment sales brokers who were so busy in 2006 and 2007
making mucho dinero, 2009 was a time to travel to Bora Bora for a
vacation since business was nonexistent. A leading sales broker, who preferred to remain anonymous, shared his struggle over the past year. “I was lucky,” he said. “I had one sale during the year. It was the
sale of a retail condominium in the Village. Two years ago I was the
broker of the year at my firm and now I have enough to pay for
Starbucks.” Another senior investment broker didn’t sound any more optimistic. [more]

From the October issue: As commercial buildings change hands and landlords seek to squeeze more
profit out of their properties, full-service brokerage firms are
sharpening their knives for what insiders believe will be a feeding
frenzy for new office leasing opportunities. A building’s leasing agent — a firm such as CB Richard Ellis or
Cushman & Wakefield — represents the landlord in leasing
negotiations, and such contracts often are packaged with overall
building management. Unlike the residential new development condo market, where buildings
change marketing agencies frequently, most agents at commercial
buildings remain in place at a building for years with very little
turnover, records show.