Integritas Capital Provides $53M Refi on Vacant Red Hook Land

Stephen Palmese’s new credit fund, Integritas Capital, is lending $53 million to refinance one of the last undeveloped pieces of land in Red Hook, Brooklyn, Commercial Observer has learned. 

The borrower, John Quadrozzi Jr., owner of the Gowanus Bay Terminal, has owned the 12.5- acre site since the 1970s and has a lease pending with an unnamed tenant to build on the land, located at 699 Columbia Street.  

Quadrozzi is using $53 million from Integritas Capital to refinance an existing loan originated in 2019. 

The new loan carries a term of 18 months. Quadrozzi’s tenant plans to build a 150,000-square-foot M3-1 industrial building on land that is currently a parking lot, according to Palmese. Integritas Capital opened for business in 2024 as the $1 billion credit arm of Palmese’s Legacy Equity Holdings.  

“So ultimately that should be the last stop: then he will be able to put on permanent financing that’s low cost and long term,” Palmese told CO. “We’re giving him the time to negotiate with a triple-A credit tenant on a long-term basis. He’ll remove the existing parking that’s there, and the credit tenant will put up their own building “

The decision to lease and build a new building on the lot is a welcome change for a site that has been largely vacant for decades. 

“It’s the last undeveloped piece of land in Red Hook, especially at scale,” Palmese said. “It’s been independently owned by [the Quadrozzi] family since the 1970s. The family actually purchased the property from the Port Authority [of New York and New Jersey]  in the 1970s, and the property was owned by the state for about 100 years prior to that.” 

Brian Pascus can be reached at bpascus@commercialobserver.com