The family of Bowery landlord David A. Cohen sold a trio of properties in Nolita to investor Ari Zagdanski for $23.5 million, sources involved in the transaction told The Real Deal.
The low-lying buildings are home to the kinds of lighting-supply stores that have long characterized the gritty strip, and though the properties come with air rights, Zagdanski said he has no immediate plans to develop the property.
Cohen’s adult children oversaw the all-cash sale of 162-166 Bowery, which have about 75 feet of frontage along the thoroughfare.
“They live down in Florida and the plan was to sell this,” said Matthew Marshall of the brokerage Marshall Real Estate, which brokered the deal. “They already identified something to buy down in Florida closer to home.”
The Cohens, who owned the buildings since the 1970s, have passive interests in other properties in the neighborhood, but Marshall said those would be longer-term holds for the family.
“This is pretty much the only thing left they own where there’s a controlling interest,” he said.
The three properties have two retail units and 11 residential apartments spanning 23,379 square feet, with another 21,249 square feet worth of air rights.
The site had previously been in contract with a different broker as a mixed-use development site asking $30 million, but that deal fell apart. Zagdanski told TRD that he has no plans to redevelop the property, but has his eye on the retail spaces, where leases are expiring in the mid-term.
This is the second purchase in New York City for Zagdanski’s firm, Kinsmen Property Group. The company bought the 122-unit Icon rental building at 306 West 48th Street in 2012. He comes from a construction and development family with properties in Toronto and Ontario and is branching out in the city.
“This is now our second acquisition and we’re looking to grow our portfolio in New York,” he said.
Alex Heydt of Town Residential was involved in the deal on the buyer’s side.
The properties sit a block north from the site at 134-142 Bowery that John Young’s Emmut Properties bought for $47 million in 2015 with plans to develop a 62-unit apartment-hotel with retail on the ground floor.