Zara Billionaire Jettisons 366 Madison at 57% Loss

A billionaire with a taste for Florida real estate is taking the opposite approach in the Big Apple, as a unit of Pontegadea, the family office of Zara founder Amancio Ortega, is in contract to sell 366 Madison Avenue to the Sioni Group for $50 million, 57 percent less than the company paid for the office building.

An Eastdil Secured team including Will Silverman, Gary Phillips, Jeff Organisciak and Carly Shoulberg served as exclusive advisor to the seller. Bloomberg was first to report the sale. 

Ortega’s company bought the 84,518-square-foot, 15-story 366 Madison for $115.5 million in 2006.

Ortega is the founder of the Inditex fashion group, best known for the Zara fast-fashion retail chain. According to Bloomberg, Ortega is worth over $104 billion.

In addition to fashion, Ortega has more than made his mark on real estate. 

In July, Ortega bought the 30-story Sabadell Financial Center building, at 1111 Brickell Avenue in Miami’s Brickell neighborhood, for $275 million, according to reporting in Commercial Observer. It was the largest office deal in South Florida in 2025 to that point.

One month earlier, Ortega bought a 46-story luxury multifamily tower in nearby Fort Lauderdale, at 201 South Federal Highway, from Related Group for $165 million.

And, while Ortega was setting milestones in building acquisition in South Florida, he was also scaling new heights on the leasing front. 

In April of this year, the Ortega-owned 2701 South Le Jeune Road in Coral Gables, which occupies 551,110 square feet over 15 stories, signed City National Bank of Florida to a lease for 144,878 square feet, the largest office lease in South Florida since 2023, according to reporting in CO. The deal included renaming the building City National Financial Center.

Ortega has also made investments in industrial in South Florida, with Pontegadea acquiring Bridge Point Cold Logistics Center, a 312,103-square-foot cold-storage facility at 3995 West 108th Street in Hialeah, for $113 million in December 2023.  

At a time when the upper echelons of New York City’s commercial real estate community are sounding the battle cry against the possible mayoralty of self-proclaimed democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani, with many threatening an exodus to South Florida as a result, Ortega’s purchases and castoffs can be looked at with some interest.

That said, while Ortega might be shedding value-depressed New York City commercial real estate as an owner, the same cannot be said for the Zara chain, which opened an 18,000-square-foot store at 31 West 34th Street in July. 

Ortega’s office and Sioni Group did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Eastdil Secured declined to comment.

UPDATE: This article was updated to clarify Eastdil Secured’s role in the transaction.

Larry Getlen can be reached at lgetlen@commercialobserver.com.