A nonprofit inked a 30-year lease in Northwood’s 1180 Sixth Avenue in a condominium leasehold deal that lowers the rent by shaving off the cost of property taxes.
Selfhelp Community Services is moving from its current headquarters at 520 Eighth Avenue. The nonprofit, which serves seniors, is taking 46,000 square feet on the second and third floors of the Midtown West office tower.
Asking rents in the Class A building are in the mid $60s per square foot. But Selfhelp was able to lower its cost by applying for a property tax exemption available to nonprofit tenants that sign leases of 30-plus years, OPEN Impact Real Estate broker Stephen Powers said.
The landlord, Northwood Investors, had to convert the entire space occupied by Selfhelp into a condominium in order to get the exemption. It will also pay to build out the space.
“Because of the pandemic, landlords are willing to get more creative and they like the idea of a 30-year lease,” Powers said.
The nationwide office vacancy rate at the end of 2023 was 19.6 percent, a high since Moody Analytics began tracking it in 1979.
Selfhelp will reduce its footprint when it moves to the new space through employees’ seat sharing and hybrid work schedules.
“Our new headquarters lease will not only reduce our tax burden but also provide us with a high-quality, custom-designed space that supports our community members, both staff and clients, and meets our unique needs,” Selfhelp CEO Stuart C. Kaplan said. “We’re excited to see the new space come together.”
OPEN’s Lindsay Ornstein and Alex Smith and Thomas Hines of Transwestern also represented Selfhelp. A Cushman & Wakefield trio including Bryan Boisi and Michael Baraldi represented the landlord.
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