SL Property Group Pays $7.825M for 430 Amsterdam Avenue Building

SL Property Group paid $7,825,000 for the five-story building at 430 Amsterdam Avenue in April, and the new owner’s move to reposition the ground floor is what pushed out Jake’s Dilemma, the bar that had poured there for 32 years.

The deed, recorded with the city register on May 5 and dated April 30, shows the buyer entity as 430 AMS Owner LLC, managed care of MD Squared Property Group, a Manhattan firm that oversees roughly 119 buildings and 2,433 units around the city. Hoodline identifies SL Property Group, the value-add multifamily investment firm founded by Sean Lefkovits, as the buyer behind the deal. The seller of record was 430 Amsterdam Partners LLC together with the Banchik Family Limited Partnership, both listed care of MNM Properties LLC.

Why it matters

A new owner buying an occupied, income-producing walk-up and immediately marketing the ground floor for a higher-end tenant is a straightforward retail repositioning play, and it is the kind of move other Upper West Side landlords will watch closely given how tight sit-down dining space is west of Central Park. For a developer or investor scanning the corridor, the deal also flags a lot sized well under its zoning envelope, the kind of unused capacity that shows up in an acquisition underwriting model even when no rezoning or new construction is planned.

The numbers

The $7,825,000 price works out to about $561 per square foot against the building’s 13,945 square feet of total floor area, and roughly $391,250 per residential unit across its 20 apartments, neither figure disclosed in the commercial listing marketing. PLUTO records put the lot at 2,900 square feet, zoned C2-7A with an EC-2 overlay, carrying a maximum facility FAR of 7.50 against a built FAR of 4.81, meaning close to 7,800 square feet of as-of-right development rights sit unused on the site. The listing is marketing 2,500 square feet of ground-floor retail plus a 1,900 square foot lower level, the space Jake’s Dilemma has occupied since 1994, for “upscale sit-down dining or premium healthy concepts,” according to Hoodline’s reporting on the broker materials.

What’s next

Jake’s Dilemma pours its last round on October 18, and its staff is moving to The Gin Mill, a sister bar a few blocks away at 442 Amsterdam Avenue under the same hospitality group. No Department of Buildings permit has been filed yet for the ground floor or lower level under this ownership, so any buildout for a new tenant is still pending. The 20 residential units above are not part of the retail repositioning and show no ownership change beyond the April sale. More on the New York market.