Sotheby’s buys Long Island City office building for $82 million

Sotheby’s facilitated the sale of more than $7 billion worth of artwork, jewelry and other rare collectibles last year, but it’s kicking off 2022 with its own purchase.

The luxury auction house is expanding its presence in New York, acquiring a recently converted office building in Long Island City for $82 million.

Sotheby’s purchased the nine-story building at 25-11 49th Avenue, also known as Gantry Point, from Columbia Property Trust and State Street, records show. The auction house, which was founded in London but is headquartered on the Upper East Side, has confirmed the purchase to The real deal.

The deal for the property, a former warehouse converted into nearly 240,000 square feet of office space, allows Sotheby’s “to establish state-of-the-art operations to support our growth ambition,” said Jean-Luc Berrebi, the company’s financial director. officer, in a statement to TRD, adding that the auction house plans to centralize its processing and warehousing operations at the site.

A Cushman & Wakefield team led by Adam Spies and Josh King brokered the sale.

Located next to the Hunter’s Point subway and Long Island Railroad station, the property was acquired by Columbia (then known as Normandy Real Estate Partners) and Jonathan Zamir’s Keystone Equities for $39.1 million in 2018 after developers secured $81 million in acquisition and construction financing to convert the two-story warehouse into office space.

Sotheby’s is no stranger to New York commercial real estate, having had its longtime headquarters at 1334 York Avenue on the Upper East Side since 2009, when it bought the 500,000 square foot building for $370 million after a sale-leaseback agreement with Rosen’s Aby RFR Holding.

The auction house refinanced the building in 2020 with a five-year, $483 million variable-rate loan from Barclays.

Sotheby’s and Realogy – the publicly traded holding company that owns and operates Sotheby’s International Realty under a licensing agreement – recently acquired a joint 80% stake in Concierge Auctions, a luxury real estate auction market, for an undisclosed amount.

Columbia, meanwhile, was acquired by investment management firm PIMCO for $2.2 billion last year. At the time, Columbia’s portfolio consisted of 15 office buildings, with four more under development, as well as an additional 8 million square feet of office space it managed for private investors and corporations. third.