JEMB Signs Yeshiva University at Herald Center

It’s taken nearly two years, but a new tenant is matriculating at JEMB Realty’s Herald Center.

Yeshiva University is purchasing a 32-year condominium leasehold at JEMB’s 1293 Broadway in Herald Square, the New York Post reported. Financial details of the transaction, which the institution announced itself on Sunday, were not disclosed.

Yeshiva plans to utilize 160,000 square feet on floors five through nine for a health sciences campus. The school will also occupy space on the ground floor and mezzanine levels. With the deal, Yeshiva will occupy a majority of the 10-story, 250,000-square-foot mixed-use property between West 33rd and West 34th streets.

David Carlos, who at the time was at Savills, assisted the university in the deal, while JEMB was represented in-house by Jacob Jerome and Morris Bailey.

Yeshiva essentially replaced the for-profit ASA College at the Herald Center after that institution shut down in February 2023. ASA occupied 165,000 square feet of the property, which notably features a massive H&M store at the base. Other occupants include Bank of America and Verizon; Yeshiva’s transaction brings the property to 100 percent occupation.

The promising development for Bailey and Joseph Jerome’s JEMB comes months after the building’s owners negotiated an extension on the property’s CMBS loan right before it was due to mature at the start of the year. Iron Hound Management negotiated the extension on the $255 million mortgage, which saw JEMB put up a “significant equity infusion,” a source familiar with the deal told The Real Deal.

JEMB bought the property across the street from Macy’s out of bankruptcy in the 1980s. In 2013, it launched a $50 million overhaul of the property and lured fashion retailer H&M to 65,000 square feet two years later. The fast fashion brand sued JEMB over a dispute related to the property’s renovation, but the two sides later discontinued the case.

— Holden Walter-Warner