Zeil Feldman has brought Howard Lorber’s New Valley Real Estate firm on as an investor in his Bjarke Ingels-designed condo project on the High Line, The Real Deal has learned.
And, similar to past ventures in which the two moguls have partnered, Douglas Elliman’s new development team will lead marketing efforts on the project.
New Valley, which owns a 70-percent stake in Elliman, invested $17 million in HFZ Capital’s 76 Eleventh Avenue — also known 518 West 18th Street — according to the company’s most recent quarterly report.
HFZ closed on the $870-million acquisition of the site in May after landing $1 billion in debt and equity financing from a group including JPMorgan, BlackRock and SL Green Realty, as TRD previously reported.
Sources confirmed that Elliman will handle marketing efforts on the development, which will feature a pair of towers designed by the Danish starchitect’s Bjarke Ingels Group with some 300 apartments.
While the firm has yet to decide which brokers will work on the project, it will certainly be different than some of the more expensive developments in the neighborhood such as Scott Resnick’s 551 West 21st Street, which features a $50 million penthouse.
Feldman has reportedly decided to build condos with prices starting around $3,750 to $4,000 per square foot in a bet against what he perceives to be a potential shortage of buyers in the uber-luxury market.
HFZ, one of the city’s most active developers, regularly works with the two biggest names in new development marketing: the division at Douglas Elliman headed by Susan De Franca and Corcoran Sunshine Marketing Group, which is handling sales at HFZ’s 505 West 19th Street condo project one block north on the High Line.
But as is often the case with Lorber’s investment partners, HFZ usually goes with Elliman when it works with New Valley. Past projects include the Marquand on the Upper East Side and 11 Beach Street in Tribeca, where the brokerage brought out firepower in the form of the Eklund Gomes Team along with Melanie Lazenby and Dina Lewis to lead marketing.