Vaja Group Acquires Astoria Development Site at 24-41 31st Street for $26M

Moses Freund’s Vaja Group has purchased another development site along the 31st Street corridor in Astoria, Queens, Commercial Observer has learned. 

The developer acquired the one-story retail building at 24-41 31st Street — a former Staples location — for $26.39 million, according to broker IPRG. The 29,638-square-foot site offers nearly 150,000 buildable square feet that would support a 108-unit mixed-use development, according to IPRG’s Donal Flaherty, who represented Vaja Group. The site can also accommodate 14,000 square feet of potential retail space and parking.

Located at the corner of 31st Street and 24th Road, Vaja’s acquisition sits across 24th Road from another development site purchase — the now-demolished Neptune Diner. Vaja picked up the diner in 2025 for $11 million, according to city records, and Flaherty arranged the sale. 

Both site acquisitions were made possible by New York City’s 31st Street–Hoyt Avenue rezoning effort in 2022, which enabled a new mixed-use corridor along 31st Street.

“Scale is the hardest thing to find in Astoria,” Flaherty said in a statement. “You can buy a lot, but you can’t buy a full block with 443 feet of frontage and entitlements already in hand. Vaja understood that immediately and moved decisively.”

Earlier this year, Vaja Group also secured $84 million in bridge financing for another Astoria multifamily project, this one a 152-unit development at 11-14 35th Avenue, CO reported. 

Modern Spaces’ Evan Daniel represented the seller, 2441 Astoria Associates. The entity is part of a project team that applied to rezone and redevelop the larger 31st Street site in 2021, according to New York YIMBY, alongside MDM Development Group and 31 Neptune. 

Daniel declined to comment on the transaction, and the offices of Charles Scaturro & Sons could not be immediately reached for comment.

Emily Davis can be reached at edavis@commercialobserver.com.