[Image via Cushman & Wakefield]
Back in November, a PDF of a listing for Ben Shaoul's Bloom 62 on Avenue B and East Fifth Street arrived in our inbox. The asking price for the former Cabrini Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation was listed at $73 million — all cash.
Maybe you should have picked it up then. There's a new listing as of yesterday at Cushman & Wakefield … and the asking price is now $80 million.
Here's what you get:
A 6-story, completely renovated, mixed-use doorman building located at the southwest corner of Avenue B and East 5th Street. The property features over 120’ of frontage on Avenue B and 143’ of frontage on East 5th Street. It consists of 81 residential units and 1 ground floor retail unit. All of the residential units are FM with an average in-place rent of $83/SF.
The retail is leased to The New Amsterdam School for $400,000 per year. Overall, the property is 98.77% occupied with a gross annual income of $5,155,768. Amenities of the building include a fitness room, landscaped courtyard, and a rooftop entertainment deck featuring outdoor showers, grills, and bar-sinks. The residential units are all in spectacular condition and each has their own washer & dryer, individual temperature control, and high-end finishes through out.
This is an excellent opportunity for an investor to purchase a high cash flowing, low maintenance asset with significant upside in one of the trendiest neighborhoods in Manhattan.
Shaoul bought the place for $25.5 million from a family trust made up of the estates of Jacob W. Friedman and Sol Henkind in December 2011.
Cabrini closed for good on June 30, 2012. The 240-bed Cabrini Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation — sponsored by the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus — provided health care for low-income elderly residents in the East Village. The center opened in 1993 and served 240 patients and employed nearly 300 people.
As for Shaoul, he's off to luxurify other corners of the neighborhood.
Previously on EV Grieve:
Claim: Ben Shaoul is the new owner of Cabrini nursing home, will convert to condos
Report: Local politicians reach out to Ben Shaoul as re-sale of the Cabrini Nursing Center seems likely
More details on Cabrini's closing announcement
A look at the 'Hip young crowd planting roots at Bloom 62'
Ben Shaoul looks to make a whole lot of money converting nursing home into high-end housing
Ben Shaoul is selling Bloom 62 for $73 million — all cash!
G R E E D
ReplyDeleteSo they are asking about $1 million per unit. Why didn't I invest in the 90's?
ReplyDeleteBen Shaoul is adding almost $2 million per month for every month this property does not sell, so by next year it should be worth well over $100 million. Did he underprice it or is the market really this overheated? What goes up must come down. I can almost hear the bubble bursting now.
ReplyDeleteThe apartments generate 92% of this building's revenue, which is why so many landlords screw around for years with their retail spaces. It has nothing to do with imaginary tax breaks, they do it becuase they can afford to be greedy.
ReplyDeleteThis is what you get:
ReplyDeleteA 6-story, completely renovated, mixed-use doorman building located at the southwest corner of Avenue B and East 5th Street. The property features over 120’ of frontage on Avenue B and 143’ of frontage on East 5th Street.
It was once a single-use building which housed a revolving population of elderly, frail senior citizens from all over the city, who gratefully availed themselves of the kindness, decency and affection the caring staff administered to them. The shared rooms were small but clean, each furnished with hospital beds, bathrooms, TVs, chairs for visitors and a view of - something - out the windows. The property was usually close to 100% occupied.
Amenities of the building included a pair of sweet patrol cats, Ben and Jerry, who seemed to sense when they were needed for a visit, and who thus wandered from room to room, floor to floor, saying hello; a friendly security guard who remembered you after the first time you came through the doors and signed the visitor book; recovering seniors sitting in the library who loved the opportunity to chat; a quick meal from an understanding staffer when she realized you had come straight from work and would not get home for a while. It was not perfect - every now and then you would hear an agitated patient screaming about something or other, but it was in their room, not on the roof, and the ruckus usually did not last too long. And they never once uttered the syllable "Woo".
This was an excellent opportunity for anyone needing a neighborhood place to go to for recovery, a true asset with significant upside in keeping the city's elderly population healthy and safe.
*********************
My mother spent five weeks in Cabrini after she had open-heart surgery. Her caregivers were wonderful ladies who tended to her assiduously, allowing her to recover faster than her doctor had expected. It was such a blessing to have someplace so close to my apartment, allowing me to visit every night after work, and where I knew she would be getting the best of care, even though it was not a fancy place. (Plus, I more than once rode the elevators with the cats - best rides ever.) The fact that something so important could be excised from the neighborhood so a piece of trash like Bum Shaoul could sweep in like the winged demon that he is and turn it into a party palace for a bunch of clueless yobs is still shocking to me, although I know I am just being naive. But I wonder - where do the seniors go now? What happened to the staff, did they find other employment? And finally and most importantly, why do those in power continue to allow this non-stop raping of the city's services for the 99%?
In order to survive in this city, one must be a fucking millionaire. Ridiculous. NYC is becoming like Geneva.
ReplyDelete25.5 million investment +renovation costs turned into $80 million cash(!), meanwhile collecting an annual rental income of $5,1 million? How could a developer resist this kind of return on investment? Say what you will about the obvious soulless greed of evicting a nursing home, but this kind of profit making will continue over all the neighborhood so long as it is legal!
ReplyDeleteGojira, thank you for sharing your and your mom's story. It would be great to see a media follow-up of some sort on the long-term impact of the closure on seniors in the community and former staff.
ReplyDeleteIf you're poor, they want you gone, dead or both, and if you're rich, but not rich enough... they want the same. No surprises here.
ReplyDeletePart of the irony here is that a school of some sort is renting the ground floor. I would encourage anyone opening or thinking of opening a business to consider who they are renting space from. Businesses that rent spaces from Shaoul, Icon or Crowman are lining the pockets of some pretty evil people.
ReplyDeleteThere were reports that some of the former residents of Cabrini died soon after being displaced from their home. Shaoul put a dollar sign on their lives and could care less. I organized a demo at his office the last time I was in NY to point this out. He is much like the Islamic State or ISIS except he uses money to displace people and ruin their lives.
ReplyDeleteThank you, Katz's Delicatessen, for selling your air rights to this guy.
ReplyDeleteJohn Penley,
ReplyDeleteNo doubt some of the residents did pass away after leaving the building, particularly those at an advanced age. They would have died in the building.
Your statement is vacuous.
I spoke to one family member who told me his grandmother was depressed and disoriented when she was evicted from the building and moved to New Jersey and he felt she died because of the move. Even if they had died in the building at least they would not have had to go through a move and would have died in the neighborhood they lived their lives in. Anonymous you are a stupid ahole.
ReplyDeleteI've commented on here before and have said money is the bane of our existence. Without money anywhere you're fucked. Without money in NYC, you might as well jump in the east river.
ReplyDeleteDoes the building still have the old nursing home smell of rice, feces, and death?
ReplyDeleteWhat can be said about Ben Ghaoul and NYC landords that hasn't been said a million times before?
ReplyDeleteEVers need to be contacting their Assembly member and State Senator to demand better rent regulations when they come up for renewal this June.
Brian Kavanagh Assembly EV/LES 212-979-9696
Sheldon Silver LES/Chinatown 212-312-1420
Brad Hoylman State Senate EV (upper) 212-633-8052
Daniel Squadron State Senate EV/LES/Chinatown 212-298-5565
So now real estate business types are the same as ISIS? You really need a psychological evaluation. I'm sure this building will sell as it is a good investment. God forbid that happens right? Some of you people need to wake up to reality. I don't know what kind of psychological care you need- but you need some. Making poor life choices or just deciding to be low income doesn't entitle you to a Manhattan apartment. Sorry. What exactly do you self proclaimed 'artists' contribute anyway? Besides whining and complaining that is. The 1970s aren't coming back. Deal with it. the antiquated rent laws have done tremendous damage to this city.
ReplyDeleteYeap, people in the real estate business are parasites. I'm sure that the buckets of money you're earning will allow you to ignore the rape of the East Village, so enjoy it.
ReplyDeleteGojira,
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you (and your mother) had a positive experience at Cabrini. I worked there for several years, with a roughly 6 month break at one point, but was one of the people who was there until about 10 days before closing.
It was definitely an old, institutional looking facility, but there were some good people who worked there (and a few not, as with anywhere).
It was an increasingly stressful time from when final word was given that we were closing and there was a *very* short time period to relocated all the residents and employees. Some employees moved to other facilities, one or 2 in Manhattan and the others in Brooklyn, mostly. Many long term residents were moved to other facilities in Manhattan, Westchester, a few further upstate or to other states. A significantly large group of residents (and some short term rehab patients) were moved to Boro Park Nursing and Rehab facility in Borough Park, Brooklyn, where they were doing renovations that would accommodate enough residents that would fill almost a whole floor themselves. Quite a number of staff went to work there as well.
John Penley made a comment about residents dying after being moved, for which he was admonished, but I also heard of a number of people having moved elsewhere and passing away not long after. Many that were not in particularly poor health prior to moving. Coupled with an increase in a number of long term residents awaiting relocation suddenly experiencing some significant medical declines/incidences that ended up being terribly incapacitating, I have always believed that they sensed? felt? an underlying stress about the move, even when they may not have really had the capacity to completely understand what was going on and yet to come. Granted they were old, with various conditions, many chronic, but it always seemed much too strange that in the space of a month or slightly more, that there was such an increase in random, significant medical issues occurring, which even in younger people, are not infrequently brought on by stress.
And to end with an FYI re the cats - Jerry passed away on Christmas Day 2011, about 6 months before closing and Ben is still with me, with a medical condition that requires medication and more periodic vet checks at times, but he's still kicking at approx 16 yrs old. :-)