04 August, 2024

This 23-Floor Manhattan Office Building Just Sold at a 97.5% Discount

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/01/nyregion/manhattan-office-building-auction.html

The sale price of 135 West 50th Street in Midtown, which is only 35 percent full, was a sign of how much the pandemic upended the market for office buildings in New York City. [...]

The buyer faces an immediate financial challenge: The auction was for the building itself, not the land. That is owned by a publicly traded real estate firm, which collects a monthly lease. But the rent from the building’s current tenants is not enough to cover those monthly payments, which are set to increase every five years and do not expire until 2123.