How This Developer Sold an $8M Condo in Gravesend

An $8 million sale doesn’t typically raise eyebrows in Brooklyn’s Gravesend neighborhood.

The enclave, home to a tight-knit Syrian-Jewish community, has become known for its single-family homes that often trade for millions of dollars, as wealthy local families swap expensive homes like trading cards.

Last year, Eli Gindi, a member of the Gindi real estate family, sold his 10,000-square-foot home at 2126 East Fourth Street for $32 million to Victor Hakim, setting a borough record. Other recent pricey sales have included a home at 2085 East Third Street that Jeff Sutton purchased for $7 million last June and a $9.3 million home at 1981 East 2nd Street bought by Marvin Azrak.

But an $8 million sale in a condo building was unheard of — until this month.

A new penthouse in a 12-unit development at 346 Avenue U dubbed The Opal Residences sold for $7.5 million, public records show. The sale sets a record price for a condo in the neighborhood, surpassing Unit 5A in the building, which sold for $7 million in November.

The developer behind the project is Lee Cohen’s Redhoek+Partners, which scooped up a former funeral home parking lot on the corner of Avenue U and West Street for $8.5 million in 2022, according to public records.

A micro-neighborhood

Born and raised in Gravesend, Cohen said his knowledge of the neighborhood’s “micro-environment” allowed him to understand that there is a client base that appreciates the development’s location.

Unlike most parts of the city, where real estate prices revolve around water views or park access, the priciest homes in Gravesend are blocks from several major synagogues on Ocean Parkway, like Congregation Share Zion.

Local families also often buy homes near each other as generations expand. Sutton’s purchase last year came just three years after he dropped $14 million for a home across the street at 2088 East 3rd Street.

Most of the activity revolves in a small square bounded by McDonald Avenue to the West, Ocean Parkway to the East, Avenue R to the North and Avenue U to the South.

Cohen’s project sits just inside the southern border. Still, he said it was not easy to convince lenders unfamiliar with the area that the project could combine prices above $2,000 per square foot for a relatively untested property type.

“You can’t pull comps from 10 blocks away, because 10 blocks away may be outside of that circle of the micro [neighborhood],” he said.

Cohen eventually secured over $22 million in financing from S3 Capital for the project, which had a projected sellout of $68.5 million for 12 units and 20 parking spaces when the state attorney general’s office accepted the condo filing plan in 2024.

All units are “spoken for,” according to Cohen. Seven units have closed for an average discount of almost 12 percent from the original offering plan, public records show.

The project’s location in the neighborhood’s most desirable cross streets has been the number one driver of sales, according to Cohen. The rarity of amenities like a doorman, full-time valet and on-site superintendent in a majority single-family part of Brooklyn has also pulled buyers in, he said.

There are only a handful of other condo buildings in the vicinity, according to Marketproof, one of which appears to be a 12-unit building next door at 2102 East 1st Street from Cohen. (Cohen did not respond to a request for clarification on the relationship between the projects.)

A team including Eli Gindi — the recent seller of Brooklyn’s most expensive home — and Eli Dweck developed a 28-unit condo building at 400 Avenue U in 2007.