UPDATED, 2:40 p.m., Sept. 28: The former site of a five-story rental building destroyed in the fatal Second Avenue gas explosion sold for $6 million, nearly $4 million less than its original ask.
The buyer, according to records filed with the city on Tuesday, is Ezra Wibowo. Owner George Pasternak started marketing the East Village property in March, with a listing price of $9.7 million. The site, according to the New York Post, has up to 10,000 buildable square feet for condo or rental development with a commercial overlay.
Lee Odell Real Estate’s Fernando Romero had the listing. Wibowo could not immediately be reached for more information on his plans for the property.
Pasternak set out to sell the property roughly a year after a gas explosion in the area killed two people and injured 25 others. An illegally-installed gas line at 121 Second Avenue caused the explosion. The building’s owner, Maria Hrynenko, and four others were arrested and charged with manslaughter and negligent homicide for their alleged role in the blast. The estate of one of the victims, Nicholas Figueroa, filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Hrynenko, a contractor and the city.
After the explosion, Hrynenko had to demolish two of her buildings and Pasternak was forced to wreck his five-story, three-unit rental building at 123 Second Avenue.