Blackstone Buys Ken Griffin's Worth Avenue Office for $86M

Blackstone Real Estate is paying $86 million for Ken Griffin’s three-story office and retail building at 125 Worth Avenue in Palm Beach, an all-cash deal that pulls one of the country’s largest institutional landlords deeper into the tightest luxury corridor in the country.

Why it matters

National office demand is still stuck near multi-decade lows, but Palm Beach’s Worth Avenue is trading like a different asset class entirely. Blackstone told Commercial Observer it plans to renovate both the retail and office floors to keep pace with the strip’s evolution, a signal that a name-brand institutional buyer sees enough tenant depth on the island to underwrite a repositioning, not just hold for yield. For developers eyeing the West Palm Beach and Palm Beach office corridor, the deal is a read on where outside capital still believes small-footprint, boutique office product can work: next to retail scarcity and a wealthy resident base, not in a commodity high-rise. “High-street retail continues to experience strong fundamentals, and Palm Beach represents one of the highest performing luxury retail markets in North America,” Blackstone Real Estate principal Elena Clarfield said.

The numbers

The roughly 50,000-square-foot building sold for $86 million, or about $1,720 per square foot on the building’s footprint. Griffin, the Citadel and Citadel Securities founder, bought the property in 2023 for $83 million from Dreyfuss Management and Frisbie Group, meaning the disposition covers his basis with a modest gain over three years even before renovation costs. This is Griffin’s second Worth Avenue sale in under a year: he sold 151 Worth Avenue to the family of GoldenTree Asset Management’s Steven Tananbaum in November 2025.

What’s next

Blackstone has not disclosed a timeline or budget for the renovation, or whether it plans to keep the building’s current office tenants through the work. The sale continues a pattern of Griffin trimming his Worth Avenue retail and office holdings even as he keeps building out Citadel’s Palm Beach and South Florida footprint elsewhere, including the firm’s Brickell headquarters assembly. Watch whether other institutional buyers follow Blackstone onto the strip, or whether this trade stays a singular bet on Worth Avenue’s scarcity.