KVI Mezz Corp., which is part of Apollo Real Estate Advisors LP2 of Purchase, New York, has acquired the Knickerbocker Village rental apartment enclave in Lower Manhattan for about $150 million, according to documents recently on file with the New York City Department of Finance.
The very handsome, dark brown-brick complex, which has address of 10, 20, 30 and 40 Monroe Street, was built in 1933 and has about 1,590 apartments.
It had been owned by Knickerbocker Village Inc., which is controlled by Cherry Green Property and which had been seeking to have the apartments deregulated. The sellers listed in the papers on file with the city were Robert and Melvin Gershon, Lawrence Wolf, Susan Wolf and Howard Kestenberg for a sale of more than $72 million and Irene Pletka for a sale of more than $77.6 million.
An article by Adam Pincus in the October 12, 2007 on-line edition of The Real Deal said that in July, a spokesman for the Department of Housing and Community Renewal "said there appeared to be no precedent for a conversion from an Article 4 rental to an Article 4 co-op" under the New York State Private Financing Housing Law. The department declared last year that the development could be transferred to a private entity and subject to rent-stabilization regulations, but subsequently Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Walter Tolub ruled in favor of the tenants who sought to overturn the department's decision. Last week, the Appellate Division heard the Knickerbocker Village Inc. appeal on the ruling, but according to Mr. Pincus's article, "a ruling date is not known."
Michelle Manoff of Rubenstein Public Relations, which represents Apollo, told CityRealty.com today that Apollo had "no comment."
According to Phillip Lopate, the author of "Waterfront, A Journey Around Manhattan," the complex, "just behind the old New York Post Building, between Catherine and Market Streets...made history as the first major housing development even partially supported by public funds." "The other historical significance of Knickerbocker Village," he continued, "is that it stands on the same site as the notorious Lung Block, which it obliterated...[and which had the highest tuberculosis incidence of any street in the city." "Fred C. French, the same developer who had built Tudor City a few years earlier (1925-31), put together Knickerbocker Village, which, completed in 1933, housed 4000 persons on five acres in twelve-story blocks around inner courts....French had to travel to Washington over fifty times, hat in hand, to get an $8 million loan from the federal government's Reconstruction Finance Corporation for the housing development. The sticking point was the government's objection that the complex had a density at least double that recommended by federal guidelines, but which the developer argued was needed for a satisfactory investments."
"Among the lower-middle-class strivers attracted to Knickerbocker Village," Mr. Lopate wrote, "were Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, who moved into a three-room apartment in the spring of 1942" for $45.75 a month for their river-view, eleventh floor accommodations...and it was there, the bulk of evidence now suggests, that Julius conspired with Ethel's brother, David Greenglass, to spy for the Soviet Union," according to Mr. Lopate.
The very handsome, dark brown-brick complex, which has address of 10, 20, 30 and 40 Monroe Street, was built in 1933 and has about 1,590 apartments.
It had been owned by Knickerbocker Village Inc., which is controlled by Cherry Green Property and which had been seeking to have the apartments deregulated. The sellers listed in the papers on file with the city were Robert and Melvin Gershon, Lawrence Wolf, Susan Wolf and Howard Kestenberg for a sale of more than $72 million and Irene Pletka for a sale of more than $77.6 million.
An article by Adam Pincus in the October 12, 2007 on-line edition of The Real Deal said that in July, a spokesman for the Department of Housing and Community Renewal "said there appeared to be no precedent for a conversion from an Article 4 rental to an Article 4 co-op" under the New York State Private Financing Housing Law. The department declared last year that the development could be transferred to a private entity and subject to rent-stabilization regulations, but subsequently Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Walter Tolub ruled in favor of the tenants who sought to overturn the department's decision. Last week, the Appellate Division heard the Knickerbocker Village Inc. appeal on the ruling, but according to Mr. Pincus's article, "a ruling date is not known."
Michelle Manoff of Rubenstein Public Relations, which represents Apollo, told CityRealty.com today that Apollo had "no comment."
According to Phillip Lopate, the author of "Waterfront, A Journey Around Manhattan," the complex, "just behind the old New York Post Building, between Catherine and Market Streets...made history as the first major housing development even partially supported by public funds." "The other historical significance of Knickerbocker Village," he continued, "is that it stands on the same site as the notorious Lung Block, which it obliterated...[and which had the highest tuberculosis incidence of any street in the city." "Fred C. French, the same developer who had built Tudor City a few years earlier (1925-31), put together Knickerbocker Village, which, completed in 1933, housed 4000 persons on five acres in twelve-story blocks around inner courts....French had to travel to Washington over fifty times, hat in hand, to get an $8 million loan from the federal government's Reconstruction Finance Corporation for the housing development. The sticking point was the government's objection that the complex had a density at least double that recommended by federal guidelines, but which the developer argued was needed for a satisfactory investments."
"Among the lower-middle-class strivers attracted to Knickerbocker Village," Mr. Lopate wrote, "were Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, who moved into a three-room apartment in the spring of 1942" for $45.75 a month for their river-view, eleventh floor accommodations...and it was there, the bulk of evidence now suggests, that Julius conspired with Ethel's brother, David Greenglass, to spy for the Soviet Union," according to Mr. Lopate.
Architecture Critic
Carter Horsley
Since 1997, Carter B. Horsley has been the editorial director of CityRealty. He began his journalistic career at The New York Times in 1961 where he spent 26 years as a reporter specializing in real estate & architectural news. In 1987, he became the architecture critic and real estate editor of The New York Post.
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