Manhattan’s rental market showed renewed strength after a rather slow first quarter. The $130 million capital improvement p...
Manhattan’s rental market showed renewed strength after a rather slow first quarter.
The $130 million capital improvement program at 1155 Sixth Ave. continues to pay off for the Durst organization. Some 200,000 square feet of leases have been signed over the past twelve months. Today, a just-signed deal for an additional 77,000 square feet at the “Apex” of the 740,000 square foot tower has boosted occupancy to over 70%.
Global Relay USA, a division of a Canada-based company that provides technology services to financial companies, is moving from a small office at 286 Madison Ave. for 1155 Sixth Apex – a five-story building on floors 38-42. The 42nd floor is designed as a penthouse pavilion featuring a wraparound outdoor terrace and a thirteen-foot glass curtain wall that self-tints during the day to reduce glare.
The asking rent was $150 per square foot for the top floor and $115 per square foot for floors 38-41.
The top floor pavilion was previously a mechanical space. Durst created it by establishing a new double-height entrance to the lobby, which allowed floor space to transfer to the top of the tower, explained Tom Bow and Rocco Romeo, Durst’s rental bosses.
They replaced the in-house owner with Tanya Grimaldo. The tenant was replaced by Michael Cohen, Howard Kaplowitz and John Brasier of Colliers.
Cohen said Global Relay was drawn to the Apex’s “200-seat column-free auditorium”, outdoor space and “commercial-grade cuisine a stone’s throw from Bryant Park.”


1540 Broadway gets new funding
The owners of 1540 Broadway, the former Bertelsmann building, secured $590 million in financing for the office floors of the 44-story tower. The new loan confirmed confidence in the future of the tower and the entire 31 million square foot Times Square office market.
A Newmark team led by Jordan Roeschlaub and Dustin Stolly represented 1,540 owners of Broadway Edge Fund Advisors and HSBC to secure the loan from Apollo, MSD and Monarch.
It is repaying $427 million in old debts and also providing $99 million for rental campaigns, future property improvements (in addition to the $40 million in upgrades already completed), and interest reserves. , according to a prospectus.
The loan is only for office floors; Vornado has retail space at the base of the tower where tenants include the Disney Store.


The 907,000 square feet of office floors – technically a condominium, just like the Vornado part – are 66% leased to 19 tenants including pharmaceutical software developer Schrodinger Inc.. is the largest at 108,000 square feet. The loan offer quotes starting rents at 1540 Broadway between $75 and $90 per square foot.
The building opened in 1992 as the headquarters of German media conglomerate Bertelsmann, which sold it in 2004.
Time Warner at Deutsche Bank
The transformation of Related Companies’ Columbus Circle megaproject from a media hub to a financial center is nearing completion.
Hedge fund PDT Partners, founded by math wizard Peter Muller, has leased 110,000 square feet in the office portion of the twin-towered skyscraper that used to be called Time Warner but is now Deutsche Bank Center.
Although the agreement is signed and sealed, it is shrouded in silence. No one we contacted would return calls or comment: the CBRE brokers who represented PDT (Ben Shapiro and Silvio Petrillo), the JLL team for Related (Peter Riguardi, Frank Doyle, Clark Finney and Ben Bass), and a representative for Related itself.

But it’s clear that PDT’s lease eats up nearly all of the remaining available office space previously held by Time Warner, which sold it back to Related in 2014. Deutsche, which moved from 60 Wall St., leases 1 .05 million out of a total of 1.2 million. square feet at Columbus Circle. Asking rents would be around $130 per square foot.
The move marks an expansion for PDT, which expands from approximately half the space to 1745 Broadway in SL Green.
Bill’s deal may not be fully prepared
The agreement we recently talked about to relaunch the Bill’s Restaurant Townhouse Site at 57 E. 54th St. might not be quite done after all.
Although we wrote on Feb. 27 that Hunt & Fish Club partner Christian Pascal was leasing the site for nearly $40,000 a month to launch a new restaurant, a sign advertising the three-story building’s availability still hangs nearby. the awning.
Meridian Capital broker James Famularo said the lease had in fact been signed. But possible problems have arisen over Pascal’s ability to finance the project amid market jitters over Ukraine and a rise in Covid-19 cases.
Everyone wants to see the long dark place brought back to life – but stay tuned.
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