RFR Facing Foreclosure Over $180M Loan at 475 Fifth Avenue

Aby Rosen and Michael Fuchs have more trouble in their New York City portfolio.

A week after being hit with a foreclosure notice at two retail properties, RFR has another on its hands, this time with lenders Citibank and J.P. Morgan Chase looking to foreclose on RFR’s $180 million loan tied to the 23-story office building at 475 Fifth Avenue, according to court records filed in Manhattan Supreme Court Thursday.

Spokespeople for Citi and J.P. Morgan did not immediately respond to a request for comment. A spokesperson for RFR said in a statement, “The property is currently well-occupied and we expect to refinance the existing debt imminently.”

Rosen and Fuchs’s RFR bought the century-old Midtown property between East 40th and East 41st streets just two years ago for $291 million, financing the deal with $260 million in loans, as Commercial Observer previously reported. The 2022 purchase was one of the biggest investment sales in New York City during a sluggish year. 

Part of that debt — a $180 million loan split into two notes — matured in June,  according to the lenders. RFR signed an agreement with the lenders in May to begin negotiating a refinancing, court records show. Those talks have failed so far and the debt went into default on June 9 after RFR didn’t pay up.

It’s been a cruel summer for Fuchs and Rosen, the latter a German-American real estate investor with a flair for collecting art. The firm the duo founded in 1991 was hit last week with foreclosure cases against two retail properties — One Jackson Square and 219 East 67th Street — saddled with $22.4 million in debt. 

And RFR’s office portfolio isn’t doing much better. 

RFR has had foreclosure proceedings underway since June on the 23-story 522 Fifth Avenue, just two blocks away from 475 Fifth, after defaulting on the $224 million loan tied to the building in December. And, in October, lender Union Labor Life Insurance Company started a foreclosure action at 670 Avenue of the Americas after RFR allegedly failed to make payments on its $15 million loan, PincusCo reported.

Abigail Nehring can be reached at anehring@commercialobserver.com.