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THE HOTTEST PLACE TO BE
June 6, 2012
| If you look on a retailer’s shopping list, you’ll find “Being in NYC” next to the milk, bread, and toilet paper. And it’s not just one store, we learned at Bisnow’s second annual New York Retail Summit Monday (see previous coverage here). |
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| “In New York, you’re not established until there are three or four stores,” Ackman-Ziff managing director David Robinov told attendees. In fact, the demand is so strong that retailers are finding creative ways to get themselves into the city, much like Home Depot’s multiple-level store on Third Avenue and Trader Joe’s, which took two sublevels on Broadway and 72nd, he says. There's also Joe Fresh at 510 Fifth, located mainly on the second level. (Does that mean retailers will soon seek prime locations on rooftops?) |
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| Midtown Equities principal Jack Cayre agrees. “It’s not cookie-cutter space here,” he says. The landlord is trying to educate retail tenants and help them envision what can be done in unique space configurations. By establishing your brand here, you can carry yourself throughout the US—think of what Uniqlo has done. |
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| Handler Real Estate Org principal Scott Galin was helping a retailer open 12 stores over two years here, and even as they were looking, new hot spots were continually popping up, like Times Square South. Tourism is 24/7, and retail is following the advent of new hotels. The sector is even going to places where you wouldn’t have necessarily walked around in the past, like Alphabet City and up in the 120s. |
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| Retailers are finally realizing that traffic doesn’t stop at Rockefeller Center, says Cushman & Wakefield EVP Joanne Podell. We’ll see tenancy continue to improve on Fifth Avenue, particularly around the emerging NoMad submarket. (If you’re not up on your neighborhood slang, that’s north of Madison Square Park.) And we’re seeing this all over the city. “There’s nowhere else [retailers] can go where they’re ensured they’ll do business in the future.” |
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| Moderator Glenn Brill, a managing director at great sponsor FTI Consulting. Opportunity is particularly ripe Downtown, which Joanne points out is under-retailed. But there’s very little availability: “It needs more space,” she says. Adding to this demand are the vacant office buildings that have been backfilled by residential and the National September 11 Memorial & Museum, one of the most popular tourist stops. |
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| Want to look at retail listings in a new light? Click the video to learn more about sponsor RetailMLS, which recently launched a user-friendly multiple listing service specifically for the sector. You can also learn more here. |
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| Peter Steier, Jonathan Stern, and Justine Hughes of sponsor Meridian Capital Group didn’t intentionally color-coordinate outfits (that Meridian blue must be engrained). The real estate finance advisor, freshly back from ICSC RECon, has been actively closing retail financing transactions, including a $23.4M, seven-year loan on a Home Depot in Paramus, NJ and a $6.5M mortgage on a 9,700 SF retail property on West Broadway. Learn more about our sponsorhere, and join us on June 28 for Bisnow's NY Investment Summit, which will feature Meridian Capital Group CEO Ralph Herzka. |
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| We snapped New York Grant Co’s Pinar Guvenc, Winick Realty’s Alex Hill, Fidelity National Title’s Tim Oberweger, Choice New York Management prez Michael Feldman, and Brooklyn Law School student Rafe Serouya among our attendees. Alex and Tim recently returned from ICSC RECon, which they report was full of energy and optimism. Alex is marketing 36k SF of retail space (ground/basement) at 320 Eighth Avenue, which he says has gotten a lot of attention from national gyms. He also recently closed five deals on Seventh Avenue. |
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| CPEX Real Estate’s Duke McCabe, Andre Sigourney, and Jay Sendogdular tell us there’s not one neighborhood in NYC not receiving attention from retailers. “People want to get in early,” says Duke, who along with colleague Tim Conan repped the sellers in the $3.1M Harlem sale of 2207 Adam Clayton Powell Jr Blvd to a religious not-for-profit group. He also repped the seller in the recent $1.2M sale of the 4,800 SF 1741 Bath Ave in Bensonhurst. |
