Sound studio gears up to renew Midtown South lease

A sound production studio in Midtown South has renewed its soon-to-expire lease, even though the tenant’s rent will nearly triple thanks to the neighborhood’s skyrocketing commercial rents.

Sound Lounge has inked a ten-year extension for its 24,000-square-foot lease at the Abron family’s 149 Fifth Avenue, near the Flatiron Building. Asking rent for the 173,159-square-foot building in the historic Ladies’ Mile district was $65 per square foot, up from the $25 per square foot the company paid in the early 2000s, Crain’s reported.

Jason Greenstein of Newmark Grubb Knight Frank represented both the tenant and the landlord in the deal.

“It was a case where this building and this space had come to define in many ways Sound Lounge’s brand and their success,” Greenstein told Crain’s. “And they were willing to pay a much higher rent to continue to be in a space that they knew really worked for them.” [Crain’s] — Angela Hunt