$158M Tower On 27th

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By LOIS WEISS May 17, 2006 -- PARK East Tower, a 26-story block-front apartment building at 240 E. 27th St., was just sold for $158 million to Brack Capital. Built in 1977 on Second Avenue by Wards Construction, which was also the seller, the 292,000-foot structure includes 324 apartments and a 200-car garage. Duane Reade is the retail tenant. Rama Bassalali of RMB Properties was the exclusive broker. He said the price equates to $500,000 per unit or $540 a foot, and at 16 times the gross rents equates to a cap rate of just under 4 percent. Israeli-based Brack, led here by Moshe Azougi, intends to convert it to a condo. "The seller could not refuse such a great price," said Bassalali. * The Lower East Side is getting happier feet now that a new Timberland "concept store" and showroom has leased at 15 Rivington St. The two-level 3,000-foot shop by the Rivington Hotel will be the cobbler's second Manhattan location. The first, at 709 Madison Ave. at 63rd St., opened in 1996. Brian Katz of Katz & Associates brought in the retailer, which he says had been seeking the "right" downtown spot for several years. Caroline Banker of Prudential Douglas Elliman repped the owner. * The 92nd Street Y will sell the Steinhardt Building at 35 W. 67th St. The five-story double townhouse with 22,000 feet and several meeting rooms should appeal to theater groups and not-for-profits. Brian Gell, Timothy Sheehan and Edward Midgley of CB Richard Ellis will hawk the property, donated in 2001 by philanthropist and Y Board member Michael H. Steinhardt, and valued at the time at $16 million. The building's current programs will move to temporary facilities for three to five years while the Y headquarters at 1395 Lexington Ave. is reconfigured to include them. The townhouse began life in 1904 as a home for elderly, indigent Swiss women and later housed young Swiss women. Refurbished in 1999, it has a 175-seat music performance space, a 72-seat screening room, a 115-seat lecture/reception hall, a caf�/bar and professional kitchen, a lounge/reading room, five multipurpose classrooms, an exercise room with locker facilities and an art gallery. * The former East River location of the Bulova Corporation in Greenpoint is being marketed by David Junik of Griener Maltz with an asking price of $61 million. The site at 77 Commercial St. can be built to 307,000 feet of residential and retail on a 107,000-foot plot. It's just next to George Klein's planned 1 million-foot redevelopment of the Lumber Exchange Terminal, which could also have a Manhattan Water Taxi stop. Artist Frank Stella recently bought a site for a studio nearby, through Junik. "Artists are already envisioning the coming transformation of the area," says Junik. * Smack by the new Cunard and Princess Cruise Lines terminal in Red Hook, a contract is being negotiated in the mid-$70 millions for two warehouses of more than 500,000 square feet on 1,100 feet of waterfront that can include 2,500 feet of retail frontage. This would be good news for passengers who disembarked from the Queen Mary 2 to find a desolate area with no shopping. Seven Eastern Consolidated Properties professionals, led by Peter Hauspurg, chairman & CEO, are handling the marketing for Bruce Batkin. Located at 160 and 162 Imlay St., the six-story buildings were constructed "like battleships" in 1911 for the New York Dock Company Railroad and are next to Piers 11 and 12.

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