Development plans are moving forward for the latest office building to rise in Greenwich Village.
Normandy Real Estate Partners and Columbia Property Trust finalized their joint venture for their $300 million office development at 799 Broadway, and landed a $187 million construction loan from Apollo Commercial Real Estate Finance, the partners said Thursday.
The 12-story, 182,000-square-foot project would be the first new office building developed in the neighborhood since since Edward Minskoff’s 51 Astor Place. Sources said Normandy and Columbia have not yet secured an anchor tenant, and are moving forward with the project on spec.
Atlanta-based Columbia Property Trust closed on its purchase of a 50-percent stake in the development site, acquiring it from Normandy’s previous partner, Ares Management. Columbia’s equity stake in the site of the former St. Denis Hotel is valued at $142.5 million.
Newmark Knight Frank’s Dustin Stolly arranged the financing on behalf of the JV partners with his colleagues Jordan Roeschlaub, Nick Scribani and Chris Kramer.
Dustin Stolly and Jordy Roeschlaub
Work has already started at the construction site at the corner of Broadway and East 11th Street, and the building is expected to be completed by the summer of 2020.
Normandy and Columbia will target rents in the are of $140 to $160 per square foot. JLL is handling the leasing.
Cushman & Wakefield’s Adam Spies, Adam Doneger, Kevin Donner and Josh King represented Normandy and Ares in the sale of the partial stake to Columbia.
Doug Harmon and Adam Spies
It will be one of the few ground-up, Class A office buildings in Greenwich Village, and comparable to the 51 Astor Place building Minskoff developed in 2013.
That building has been derisively referred to by some as the “Death Star,” criticized as out of character for the neighborhood. But it has also been seen as setting a new benchmark for 21st century office space.
Normandy’s other office project in the area, the repositioning of the former ABC Carpet headquarters at 888 Broadway, has attracted tenants such as the Australian software company Atlassian and Netflix.