From top: Savanna managing partners Christopher Schlank and Nicholas Bienstock and 21 Penn Plaza

New York-based real estate investor Savanna formed a partnership with the Feil Organization to purchase the office building known as 21 Penn Plaza for $137 million, the New York Post reported, marking another acquisition for the active firm. Last month Savanna picked up nearby 31 Penn Plaza for $130 million. It’s also acquired 100 Wall Street, 80 Broad Street, 386 Park Avenue South, 104 West 40th Street, 1375 Broadway and 5 Hanover Square through a $550 million real estate investment fund it closed in April. [more]

The developers overseeing the Apthorp’s controversial condominium conversion project have been hit with another two dozen violations by the city’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development, including several categorized as Class C violations — the most serious kind. According to the New York Times, a March 23 inspection of the stately Upper West Side building revealed exposed electrical wiring, a missing fire hose, illegally installed doors and padlocks in the hallways. Apthorp tenants have long complained about poor conditions as a result of the renovation project, and a visit to the building by The Real Deal last year confirmed construction zones that were not cordoned off, common areas filled with debris, exposed cables and punctured walls and ceilings. [more]

Irene Front’s Apthorp apartment has mice crawling around and a broken doorbell, but the landlord has yet to resolve all problems there, residents told the New York Times. Front, a 95-year-old Holocaust survivor, lives in the building at the southwest corner of Broadway and 79th Street, where many of the 163 apartments were once rent regulated. While the once-broken heating system in her apartment has been fixed, she says management has been slow to respond to other issues in her home (note: clarification made). Since the building was bought in 2006 by investors who started a condominium conversion, market-rate renters have left as their leases have ended. Meanwhile, the developers — including Africa Israel USA and the Feil Organization — renovated those apartments, and are now trying to sell them for $2.6 million to $7.8 million. [more]

New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo is expected to announce within days whether his office will approve the controversial
condominium conversion of the landmark Apthorp on Manhattan’s Upper West
Side. Cuomo’s office has investigated the property since
September 2009, when investor Lev
Leviev’s Africa Israel and the Feil Organization submitted a list
of 36 contracted buyers who critics allege are largely inside business
associates or relatives of the developers. Legal sources told The Real Deal that Cuomo’s office
has previously conducted extensive reviews of these buyers, including
sworn interviews, to determine whether these buyers were procured
through a transparent process or signed sham contracts to help pump up
sales figures for the developer. [more]

The St. Regis hotel

The 24,700-square-foot retail space in the St. Regis New York was recently sold to a three-way partnership of property managers for $117 million, according to a press release. GFC Fifth Avenue, which is comprised of Crown Acquisitions, Goldman Properties and the Feil Organization, bought the property, located at 2 East 55th Street at Fifth Avenue, from Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide. The space currently houses luxury retailers such as Bottega Veneta, Pucci and De Beers. GFC has six other retail properties along Fifth Avenue’s Midtown corridor, including 666 Fifth Avenue and 590 Fifth Avenue. TRD

From left: the Apthorp, the tenants’ meeting last night (Ratner pictured center at table), a tenant’s photo of a plastic-covered construction site in the building

The attorney representing the Apthorp tenants’ association is filing an application for a rent reduction today with the Division of Housing and Community Renewal, due to “ongoing degradation of services” for renters, said David Hershey-Webb, a partner with Himmelstein McConnell Gribben Donoghue & Joseph, who represents the association. The filing comes less than 24 hours after a meeting between the association and Apthorp building manager and part-owner Andrew Ratner, COO of Broadwall Consulting Services, to go over grievances which weren’t addressed in a meeting between the parties a month ago, Hershey-Webb said. Ratner faced opposition at last night’s meeting from 15 to 20 people out of approximately 100 attendees, including rent-stabilized tenants as well as renters who have bought or are planning to buy apartments in the Upper West Side condo conversion at 2201 Broadway between 78th and 79th streets.  More

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Lev Leviev, the Apthorp

Israeli billionaire Lev Leviev’s Africa Israel Group is feeling the heat at the controversial Apthorp on the Upper West Side, as rival investors in the project are raising questions about the business plan and what they say is a lack of transparency at the troubled project. Angry investors claim that Africa Israel Group and managing agent the Feil Organization have refused repeated requests for information about sales activity and other relevant data, but made a recent capital call for $2.1 million to fund an interest shortfall.

[more]

From the September issue: Peter Duncan, the president of George Comfort & Sons, would
probably not be faulted by many in the real estate community for
whooping it up with a big “I told you so” to all those who predicted he
would never seal the deal on the purchase of Worldwide Plaza. But
unlike many of his contemporaries, Duncan refuses to take a victory lap
to celebrate the deal, or boast about his prowess in timing the market. “It’s like any acquisition. Buyer’s remorse kicked in immediately,” Duncan told The Real Deal, in a half-joking sort of way. His
Madison Avenue-based firm, which previously owned more than 7 million
square feet of office space, had until recently been a rather
low-profile operation in New York. [more]