NBA Players’ Union Dribbling Down to Midtown, Selling Harlem HQ
By Terence Cullen September 9, 2015 5:00 pm
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The National Basketball Players Association, the union that represents players on the NBA’s 30 teams, is moving to Midtown and selling its uptown headquarters.
The union has inked a deal for 47,294 square feet at the Durst Organization’s 1133 Avenue of the Americas between West 43rd and West 44th Streets, according to the landlord. The deal puts the players association on the entire fifth and part of the sixth floor of the 44-story tower for 20 years.
With ceilings reaching up to 24 feet on parts of the fifth floor, the players association is installing a basketball court in what was formerly a sound stage for RCA Coporation.
“We are delighted the National Basketball Players Association has chosen The Durst Organization’s 1133 Avenue of the Americas as its new national headquarters,” said Jody Durst, the president of the Durst Organization, in prepared remarks. “We are particularly pleased that the NBPA was able to transform the old RCA sound stage into a regulation-sized basketball court. We look forward to a lasting partnership with this exciting new tenant.”
The asking rent was in the mid-$70s per square foot, according to The New York Post, which first reported news of the lease.
Durst in June renewed Bank of America‘s 115,000-square-foot lease at the 1.1-million-square-foot building for another 10 years. The landlord is also marketing roughly 300,000 square feet on lower floors of the building, which have been renovated following the Internal Revenue Service’s departure last year.
Tom Bow and Rocco Romeo of Durst represented the landlord in-house, while Arthur Mirante II and Martin Cottingham of Avison Young represented the NBA player’s union. An Avison Young spokesman did not immediately return Commercial Observer’s requests for comment.
The union plans to sell its former headquarters at 310 Lenox Avenue, between West 125th and West 126th Streets in Harlem, as part of the move. The organization is seeking about $21 million for the 21,938-square-foot structure, according to Bloomberg. That’s six times the $3.4 million that the labor group paid for the 75-year-old building in 2007.
