Christopher Schlank and Nicholas Bienstock

Schlank and Bienstock’s post-Covid years are marked by ups and downs.

Savanna has capitalized on distress by purchasing new properties at a discount. At the same time, its own prized assets have fallen into trouble.

Here’s the bad stuff: Savanna’s 24-story office tower at 141 Willoughby Street in Downtown Brooklyn never signed any leases and it lost the property to a foreclosure in August of 2025. Savanna also missed a critical loan payment of $463 million CMBS mortgage at its 680,000 square feet office tower 5 Bryant Park in the summer of 2025, according to CRED iQ. Last year, the firm sold 360 Lexington Avenue for $65 million, amounting to less than a third of the price it paid for the 270,000-square-foot office and retail property in 2019.

But Savanna is making some new acquisitions. In February, the company bought the leasehold on a 100,000-square-foot office building in the Meatpacking District for $85 million — a sharp discount from the $159 million Invesco had paid for the property in 2018.

In November 2024, Savanna acquired the newly constructed office building at 799 Broadway for $255 million, after owner Columbia Property Trust defaulted on its $270 million mortgage.

Schlank has historically focused more on the asset side, while Bienstock handles the fund segment of the business. 

— Keith Larsen