Savanna Acquiring 521 Fifth Avenue From SL Green for $381M
By Lauren Elkies Schram March 28, 2019 12:35 pm
reprints
It was only at the end of January that SL Green Realty Corp. indicated it would be putting 521 Fifth Avenue on the market to help fund its stock buyback program. And as Commercial Observer reported at the time, the building was going to hit the block a couple of weeks later.
Today, SL Green (SLG) has announced that it has agreed to sell the roughly 460,000-square-foot 39-story Class-A office property at East 43rd Street to Savanna for $381 million. The deal is slated to close in the second quarter and CBRE (CBRE)’s Darcy Stacom and William Shanahan are representing SL Green in the direct deal with Savanna.
“We were in a second round and we had a lot of people that were bidding for it but Savanna wanted to acquire the asset and came after it hard,” Stacom said. “They said they are really looking forward to taking it to a next level and have some good ideas but they weren’t specific with me.” A spokeswoman for Savanna didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
With 0 Bond Street signed and closed a month ago, this building under hard contract, as well as the Chrysler Building and 410 Madison Avenue in contract, Stacom said, “The market feels very alive and well right now.”
Built in 1929, 521 Fifth Avenue is just over 96 percent leased, with office tenants including China Trust Commercial Bank and Berkadia Real Estate Advisors. Urban Outfitters and Equinox are the street-level retail tenants in the building.
SL Green bought the asset in 2011 for $225 million, and by December 2012, it sold a 49.5 percent minority stake in the property to Plaza Global Real Estate Partners—a joint venture between LaSalle Investment Management and Quantum Global Real Estate.
