Worldwide Plaza Confirms Recapitalization Plans

Worldwide Plaza Confirms Recapitalization Plans
By Karsten Strauss 11/21/12 1:37pm

Worldwide Plaza will definitely look to recapitalize, following several months of lingering on the auction block. Sellers, George Comfort & Sons and RCG Longview, had purchased the building – located at 825 Eighth Avenue – in 2009 for just under $600 million.

http://commercialobserver.com/2012/11/worldwide-plaza-confirms-refinance-plans/

WNET signs lease at Worldwide Plaza

WNET signs lease at Worldwide Plaza
August 17, 2010 08:30 AM

Worldwide Plaza at 825 Eighth Avenue

WNET, the parent company of public television’s Channel 13, has signed a 95,000-square-foot lease at Worldwide Plaza at 825 Eighth Avenue between 49th and 50th streets, taking two floors in the 1.8 million-square-foot tower, the Post reported. Terms for the Worldwide Plaza lease were not released, but asking rents there run from $52 to $59 a square foot. The deal marks an important step forward for the building, which was purchased last year from Deutsche Bank for $605 million by a George Comfort & Sons-led partnership after Deutsche took it back from Harry Macklowe. The WNET deal is the first section being leased out of the 640,000 square feet that became available after advertising agency Ogilvy & Mather moved out in 2009 (note: correction appended). WNET will move from its current corporate headquarters at 450 West 33rd Street by the end of the year. WNET was represented by Cushman & Wakefield’s Charles Borrok and Barry Zeller in the transaction. The landlord was represented in-house by Peter Duncan, George Comfort CEO and president, and Matthew Coudert, executive vice president.

Commercial investors may look to Worldwide Plaza as model

Commercial investors may look to Worldwide Plaza as model
October 23, 2009 12:10 PM

Real estate investor Peter Duncan, who scored a deal on the 49-story Worldwide Plaza building in July, now has the chance to shape the New York commercial real estate market’s investment landscape. Duncan, who is president of George Comfort & Sons, purchased the property at 825 Eighth Avenue for $590 million, roughly a third of what Harry Macklowe paid for it in February 2007. The price means Duncan might be able to lease out the first 14 floors, which stand vacant as the second-largest empty space in the city, for as little as $30 or $40 per square foot, according to Robert Sammons, research director at Colliers ABR. Whereas Midtown office buildings have had a rough year — CB Richard Ellis Group reported that there have been no single leases in the area for more than 250,000 square feet — low prices may hasten leasing activity for the space in Duncan’s building formerly occupied by advertising firm Ogilvy & Mather. That could, in turn, encourage other investors to take on risk in buying up more New York office buildings, said Jim Frederick, also of Colliers. [Bloomberg]

http://therealdeal.com/blog/2009/10/23/commercial-investors-may-look-to-peter-duncan-s-worldwide-plaza-as-model/