Rabbi Pinto building in Midtown East that was facing foreclosure gets $22M refi

The religious group Mosdot Shuva Israel founded by Rabbi Yoshiyahu Pinto who was convicted of bribery in Israel eight years ago, refinanced a Midtown East building that had been under threat of foreclosure since 2014.

Mosdot Shuva Israel as borrower signed a refi loan with lender Parke Bank valued at $22.4 million for the midblock specialty building at 122 East 58th Street in Midtown East, Manhattan.
The deal closed on February 24, 2022 and was recorded on March 17, 2022. The prior lender was Corigin Real Estate Group which held debt that had an original loan amount of $22 million. The property has 23,712 square feet of built space and 33,542 square feet of additional air rights for a total buildable of 57,240 square feet according to PincusCo analysis of city data. The loan price per built square foot is $946 and the price per buildable square foot is $392 per the PincusCo analysis. (The price per square foot analysis is the transaction price divided by square feet as reported in public records and assumes no air rights have been sold.)
The owner bought the property on March 17, 2009, for $28.5 million. The signatory for Mosdot Shuva Israel was Yoel Moshe Pinto. The Mosdot Shuva Isael is an international religious group founded by the charismatic Orthodox Jewish leader Rabbi Yoshiyahu Pinto, who in 2014 was charged with bribery in Israel and later served a one-year prison sentence, according to the Times of Israel.

The loan signatory is Yoshiyahu Pinto’s son, Yoel Moshe Pinto, president of the New York branch of the organization. Mosdot Shuva also has a presence in Ashdod, Israel. Signature Bank in 2009 provided a $20 million loan to the group, and that loan was assigned to Corigin Real Estate Group in March 2014. That month, Corigin through the entity 122 East 58th Street Funding LLC, filed a foreclosure action, which remained active for nearly eight years, until March 1, 2022, when the loan was paid off, according to court records.

The property

The 122 East 58th Street parcel has frontage of 57 feet and is 100 feet deep with a total lot size of 5,724 square feet. The zoning is C5-2.5 which allows for up to 12 times floor area ratio (FAR) for commercial The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $4 million.

Violations and lawsuits

The property was not involved in any lawsuits or bankruptcies in the past years. In addition, according to city public data, the property has received $10,000 in OATH penalties in the last year.

Development

There are no active new building construction projects or major alteration projects with initial costs more than $5 million on this tax lot.

The neighborhood

In Midtown East, the majority, or 77 percent of the 65.7 million square feet of built space are office buildings, with residential elevator buildings next occupying 8 percent of the space. In sales, Midtown East has 4 times the average sales volume among other neighborhoods with $1.1 billion in sales volume in the last two years and is the 10th highest in Manhattan. For development, Midtown East has 4 times the average amount of major developments relative to other neighborhoods and is the 4th highest in Manhattan. It had 3.6 million square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 6 percent of the neighborhood’s built space.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of 11 of the 28 commercial properties representing 961,827 square feet of the 2,146,393 square feet. The largest owner is Moinian Group, followed by Solil Management and then ABS Partners Real Estate. There are no active new building construction projects on this tax block.

The majority, or 66 percent of the 1.6 million square feet of built space are retail buildings, with residential elevator buildings next occupying 27 percent of the space.

Surrounding

Within a 400-foot radius of 122 East 58th Street, Pincusco identified seven commercial real estate items of interests occurred over the past 24 months.
Of those seven items, one was in new building development. It was a new building permit application filed on August 20, 2021 for a 174,532-square-foot R-2 building with 145 residential units at 126 East 57th Street.
Of those seven items, one was for major renovation including a certificate of occupancy change. It was a permit issued on November 30, 2020 for the $542,000 renovation of 22,553-square-foot M building with no residential units at 715 Lexington Avenue.
Of those seven items, three were sales above $5 million totaling $33.3 million. The most recent of the three was Amerant Bank which acquired the 4,100-square-foot,  mixed-use building (K2) on 730 Lexington Avenue with a value of $12.7 million from Ashkenazy Acquisition on October 21, 2021 in a deed-in-lieu transaction.
Of those seven items, two were loans above $5 million totaling $40.5 million. The most recent of the two was MRR Development which borrowed $10 million from Israel Discount Bank secured by the 0-square-foot, six-unit office building (O5) on 686 Lexington Avenue and nine other properties on August 20, 2021.

Direct link to Acris document. link