Hotel Union Fund Turns an 1896 Sixth Avenue Block Into a Clinic

The New York Hotel Trades Council’s health fund has filed to convert an 1896 building at Sixth Avenue and 19th Street into an outpatient healthcare facility, and the two Department of Buildings applications behind it declare $17,149,968 of work across 65,010 sq ft. The mechanical filing moved through plan examination on September 16.

Why it matters

Conversion in Manhattan is usually discussed as office to residential, and the incentive programs are written for that. This is a different trade and it is happening quietly: a self insured benefit fund taking an entire small commercial building off the market to serve its own members. For a general contractor, the scope is the appeal. A healthcare fit out at this size carries medical gas, air handling, and infection control work that a standard office interior does not, which is why the systems filing alone is $7,499,968, nearly as large as the architectural package.

It is also a use that will not come back to the market. Seven floors of Sixth Avenue office and retail, in a stretch where retail vacancy has been the running story, are being permanently repurposed by an owner with no lease up risk and no exit to underwrite.

The numbers

The building is 73,270 sq ft on a 10,750 sq ft lot, seven floors, completed in 1896, split in the tax record as 55,707 sq ft of office and 17,563 sq ft of retail. It is zoned C6-2A with a built floor area ratio of 6.82, and assessed at $15,768,450.

The alteration application, filed March 29, is budgeted at $9,650,000 with Gensler as architect and covers interior and exterior non bearing partition removal and installation across floors one through seven, two mezzanine levels and the roof. The companion mechanical application, at $7,499,968, provides heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems for the conversion, with Rory Creegan of Jaros Baum & Bolles as applicant and Milrose Consultants as filing representative. A sign application went in on September 15.

What’s next

Both applications are in plan examiner review rather than permitted, so the bid package is not out yet. Watch for permit issuance and for a general contractor to appear on the filings. See our coverage of 13 Manhattan office conversions filed in six days and the New York market.