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Little-known landlord transfers $380M portfolio to children

Nicola Brusco quietly built property empire on Upper West Side

30 West 73rd Street in Manhattan (Google Maps, Getty)
30 West 73rd Street in Manhattan (Google Maps, Getty)

Succession can be a messy affair in real estate. To avoid that, the Elghanayans, of Rockrose Development fame, used a coin flip to parcel out properties among three siblings. That worked a lot better than the more traditional methods used by the Milstein family, heirs of Sol Goldman and the Harry Helmsley’s survivors, all of whom ended up in long legal battles over who would inherit what.

One landlord who quietly amassed a portfolio worth nearly half a billion dollars has just distributed most of it among his children.

Nicola Brusco, a landlord primarily operating on the Upper West Side, transferred majority ownership in about 100 properties to his five adult children, Crain’s reported, citing a notice in the City Register. The stake, roughly 80 percent of Brusco’s portfolio, is valued at $380 million.

Brusco started sweeping up properties in the neighborhood in the 1970s, when the Upper West Side was rundown. Brusco rehabilitated and restored the properties, mostly brownstone rentals close to Central Park.

The strategy, typically called value-add investing in real estate circles, is now derided by some as something “speculators” do to gentrify and drive up rents in an area. Property values have indeed soared on the Upper West Side since the 1970s, but it is considered one of the city’s most sought-after and architecturally significant neighborhoods.

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In the 1980s, many developers around the city began converting rentals to co-ops, but Brusco did not. Instead, the landlord forged ahead with building his portfolio, which includes about a dozen buildings on West 73rd Street, plus more on West 74th, West 75th and West 77th streets — essentially cornering a section of the Upper West Side.

The Brusco portfolio does dip into other neighborhoods, including Hell’s Kitchen, the East Village and the Bronx.

Brusco’s buildings have limited service and no doormen, according to the landlord’s website. Most of the buildings are walk-ups featuring fewer than 15 units.

Perhaps to avoid infighting following the transfer, Brusco awarded all five children — Nicholas, Joseph, John, Cristina and Paul — roughly equal portions of the pie. The Brusco Group, which operates the family’s rentals, did not respond to a request for comment from the publication.

— Holden Walter-Warner

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Commercial Real EstateUpper West Side