Rockefeller Center Bets on Hotel, Not Apartments, at $617 a Foot
Manhattan's conversion wave has been office to apartments. The owner of Rockefeller Center is taking the other exit, and the filing prices it to the dollar.
Illustration- Source Briefing
- Public record
- Company announcement
Tishman Speyer’s plan to turn part of 10 Rockefeller Plaza into a hotel collected its sixth amendment on September 15, and the New York City Department of Buildings still has not signed off. Job M01103346-P6 went into Plan Examiner Review the day it was filed, carrying a stated construction cost of $74,946,373 across 121,469 sq ft. Divide one by the other and it lands on exactly $617.00 per sq ft, with no remainder. That is not a round estimate, it is a cost derived from the floor area.
Why it matters
Every Manhattan conversion story for two years has pointed one way, office to apartments. We counted 13 of them in six days of city filings this month, together proposing 5,395 units. This is the other exit. When the residential math fails on a trophy floor plate, hotel is what is left, and the owner of Rockefeller Center is the one demonstrating it. Developers pricing their own building now have a benchmark from the most expensive address in the country. Read the two cost figures together, though: the Buildings Department construction cost is $74.9 million, while the announced investment in the finished hotel is more than $350 million. A conversion permit budget is not a project budget.
The news that moved today. Free email. Every weekday morning.
The numbers
The job covers 121,469 sq ft in an 18 story building on block 1264, lot 5, a Rockefeller Center tax lot the city sizes at 1,898,155 sq ft across three buildings, including 1 Rockefeller Plaza and 1230 Avenue of the Americas. The conversion is 6.4% of that. The parent job was filed October 7, 2024 and is already permitted. Sub filings from February 2025 add mechanical at $7,732,661, plumbing at $6,703,843 and sprinklers at $1,079,038, while the structural filing at $448,710 sits in objections. Eighteen days after the parent job was filed, a $3.5 billion mortgage on the same lot was recorded naming Bank of America and Wells Fargo, with RCPI Landmark Properties among the borrowers. The job is enrolled as #316 in the Buildings Department’s voluntary Major Projects Program, which assigns a project advocate and costs $50,000 to join.
What’s next
None of this is an approval. The amendment is in plan examination and the structural sub filing carries open objections. The hotel is The Nell New York, 134 rooms under Aspen Hospitality’s Nell brand, and the opening target has slid to fall 2027 from the 2026 date announced with the deal. One record oddity: the owner field on the recent amendments reads “Tishaman Speyer,” a misspelling, while the parent job names RCPI Landmark Properties LLC. Watch it against the rest of the New York market and our tally of 13 Manhattan office conversions proposing 5,395 apartments.
Quick answers
- What is the latest on 10 Rockefeller Plaza?
- The sixth amendment to Tishman Speyer's office-to-hotel conversion at 10 Rockefeller Plaza is in plan review, at a stated cost of exactly $617 a sq ft.
- Who is developing 10 Rockefeller Plaza?
- SLCE Architects, according to NYC DOB NOW, job M01103346-P6.
- What are the key numbers for 10 Rockefeller Plaza?
- Stated construction cost per sq ft, our calculation: $617.00; Sq ft converting from office to hotel: 121,469; Date the parent conversion job was filed: Oct. 7, 2024; Apartments in the 13 Manhattan conversions we counted: 5,395.
On the record
The stated construction cost on the filing, $74,946,373 against 121,469 sq ft, works out to exactly $617.00 per sq ft with no remainder, meaning the cost was derived from the floor area rather than estimated independently of it.
Public record · a810-dobnow.nyc.gov
Primary record
- Public recordThe September 15 filing is the sixth amendment to a conversion job whose parent, M01103346-I1, was filed on October 7, 2024 and already carries a status of Permit Entire, so the $74.9 million figure is a 2024 cost carried forward, not a new project cost.View the record on a810-dobnow.nyc.gov
- Public recordA $3,500,000,000 mortgage and consolidation naming Bank of America and Wells Fargo, with RCPI Landmark Properties among the borrowers, was recorded against the same tax lot on October 25, 2024, eighteen days after the conversion job was filed.View the record on a836-acris.nyc.gov
- Public recordThe 121,469 sq ft being converted is 6.4% of the 1,898,155 sq ft of built area the city records on block 1264, lot 5, a Rockefeller Center tax lot that also carries 1 Rockefeller Plaza and 1230 Avenue of the Americas.View the record on zola.planning.nyc.gov
- NYC Department of Buildings, Major Projects Development ProgramVoluntary program for large and complex projects, project advocate, $50,000 enrollment fee
Company announcement
- Aspen HospitalityThe Nell New York, 134 rooms at 10 Rockefeller Plaza, more than $350 million, opening fall 2027 A company statement, not independently confirmed.