Securing financing for a big commercial deal can be a dicy process with today’s lending environment, but some fortunate buyers are able bypass the banks and put up cash.
There were over 1,900 all-cash commercial sales worth $100,000 or more in New York City since the start of 2023 — and the biggest was just shy of $1 billion.
The Real Deal analyzed city records for all commercial transactions of $100,000 or more that involved a deed without a mortgage recorded between Jan. 1, 2023, and Feb. 29, 2024. Across all of those deals, buyers dropped a combined $10.86 billion in cold, hard cash to bet on the city’s turbulent commercial sector.
Jeff Sutton executed the two largest cash deals and made a killing selling prime space to luxury brands to a combined tune of $1.79 billion.
For the biggest transaction, Sutton and SL Green sold the retail portion of 715-717 Fifth Avenue for $963 million to Kering, the French luxury group that owns Gucci, Balenciaga and Alexander McQueen.
That deal came just weeks after Sutton sold Prada the 724 Fifth Avenue home to its flagship store, along with neighboring 720 Fifth Avenue, for a combined $822 million, which was the city’s second largest all-cash deal, according to TRD’s analysis of the ACRIS records. (Sutton contends that Prada paid even more than that — $835 million — but TRD was unable to confirm that figure.)
The pack that follows the top two pale in comparison. Pulling in third was the $290 million sale by Sam Chang’s McSam Hotel Group of a hotel condo at 150 West 48th Street — home to a Hampton Inn and Home2Suites by Hilton Times Square — to the Houston-based private equity firm Dauntless Capital Partners.
The Vanbarton Group sold a newly redeveloped boutique office building at 15 Laight Street in Tribeca to South Korean automaker Hyundai for $273 million in cash to snag fourth place.
Rounding out the top five was A&R Kalimian Realty’s sale of The Aire at 150 Amsterdam Avenue to the Gotham Organization and the Carlyle Group for $265 million. Kalimian unloaded the property, which also uses the address 200 West 67th Street, months after defaulting on its nine-figure mortgage.
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Commercial
New York
Jeff Sutton sells 717 Fifth Ave to Gucci for $963M
Commercial
New York
Prada pours $835M into Fifth Ave, Jeff Sutton cashes in
Residential
New York
Cash is king on Manhattan’s West Side
The biggest all-cash deals were in Manhattan — only six of the top twenty were outside the borough — but there were a slew of smaller deals in Brooklyn and Queens worth at least $100,000. Brooklyn had 744 and Queens had 565, versus Manhattan’s 440. However, Manhattan blew them away in terms of total volume, racking up more than $6.67 billion in cash deals, with Brooklyn and Queens posting just $1.99 billion and $1.86 billion, respectively.
To access the full dataset underlying the rankings as well as key contact information, check out TRD Data, The Real Deal’s new data subscription platform.