David Werner has struck a deal to pay more than $100 million for a FiDi office building, which could be another resi-conversion play.
The investor is in contract to buy the late 1960s-era 100 Wall Street for about $115 million from Barings, sources told The Real Deal.
Werner, who recently teamed up with office-to-resi conversion king Nathan Berman on the former Pfizer headquarters in Midtown, could convert the Wall Street tower into apartments. His plans were not immediately clear.
Representatives for Werner and Barings did not immediately respond to requests for comment. A Newmark team led by Adam Spies and Josh King negotiated the sale on behalf of Barings.
The contract price is a far way off from the $270 million price tag Barings paid nearly a decade ago when it bought the 29-story office building in 2015 near the peak of the market.
Barings, through its subsidiary Cornerstone Real Estate Advisors, paid $528 per square foot for the building, which was reportedly a record at the time for an office building in the Financial District east of Broadway.
At the time, the tower was 97 percent occupied. Today, it’s 75 percent leased.
Barings owns the building debt-free, having paid off the $137.5 million New York Life Insurance mortgage in 2022, according to property records.
Werner, meanwhile, is a prolific (if publicity-shy) investor mostly known for his office properties. But he does pick and choose his residential investments carefully.
His company David Werner Real Estate Investments recently teamed up with Berman to convert Pfizer’s former headquarters at 219-235 East 42nd Street into roughly 1,500 apartments, which would be the largest office-to-resi conversion in history.
The company says it owns 3,600 apartment units in the Southeast and the Parkmerced Apartments in San Francisco.
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