Newcomer Stratco to focus on ‘high-stress’ assets

Stratco Property Group — Stratco is a combination of the words strategy and command — officially launched July 1. The company specializes in repositioning troubled real estate assets in the New York City area, with an eye toward what founder and principal Robert Sedaghatpour called managing “high-stress and high-risk situations, even including dealing with criminal activity in buildings.

The company, which has been incubating its business model since November, has three employees and has been consulting on more than 20 properties, Sedaghatpour said. Its projects have included the removal — in concert with law enforcement — of a neighborhood street gang from a Manhattan residential building. Sedaghatpour, who would not disclose other identifying details about the property, said the gang had damaged the building’s roof and occupied a vacant retail space, preventing owners from leasing it.

In another less dramatic instance, Stratco worked on behalf of a lender, taking over construction on a stalled condominium complex in Westchester County. Stratco analyzed what still needed to be completed, and negotiated with the homeowners association and the local Department of Buildings in regard to litigation pending against the borrower. The project was completed, and the remaining units sold.

In 2003, Sedaghatpour founded Maccabee Homes, a Great Neck, N.Y.-based home building company that’s still in business. He also worked for an investment firm that specialized in repositioning multi-family and retail assets.

Stratco’s goal this year is to become the city’s go-to consulting firm for troubled multi-family properties, Sedaghatpour said.