Flushing investor buys Mormon church site for $27M

A Flushing-based investor just paid $27 million for a two-story building owned by the Mormon church — a site not too far from its (at one time) controversial new church.

Xin Xiang Lin purchased 144-27 Sanford Avenue in Flushing, documents filed with the city’s Department of Finance show. The site, owned by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, has roughly 84,000 build-able square feet.

Representatives for the church and Xin were not immediately available to comment on the deal or potential plans for the property.

The church purchased the site back in 1994 from the First Church of Christ, Scientist, records show. A new Mormon church was recently built nearby at 145-13 33rd Avenue, amid fierce community opposition. In July 2012, the city Board of Standards and Appeals unanimously approved the church’s plans for a chapel more than one-and-a-half times the size of what is allowed under the lot’s zoning, the New York Daily News reported at the time.

Some residents disputed the church’s need for extra space and suggested that a new building instead be erected at the church’s Sanford Avenue location, since it was already zoned for more space. The church’s leaders argued that that would’ve displaced its congregants during construction.

The site’s new owner is part of a group of investors building an 84,242-square-foot condo building at 1587 East 19th Street in Midwood.