By Holly Dutton
Manhattan brokerage Citi Habitats will open a new Upper West Side office in December, merging two of its current uptown offices into the new location at 157 Columbus Ave.
The firm just signed a 10-year lease for 8,335 s/f on the second floor of 157 Columbus Ave, on the corner of 67th Street.
It will replace both 465 Columbus Avenue and 222 West 72nd Street (two small offices) into one “mega-officeˮ at 157 Columbus Avenue.
“We were looking for a new space because one of our leases was coming up,” said Citi Habitats president Gary Malin.
“It’s an ideal location, an ideal space and it’s very quintessentially Upper West Side.”
Currently under construction, the state-of-the-art space will accommodate close to 100 agents once completed, said Malin.
“It’s going to have lounges and phone booth rooms for agents, and it’s going to have a lot of communal use space that will makes agents lives better, in a less formal environment,” he said.
“We’re taking a page from the way tech companies operate, having free-flowing space for people to give them a better and more enhanced lifestyle in the office.”
Citi Habitats currently has eight sales offices in all the major neighborhoods of Manhattan, plus a corporate headquarters in the Flatiron District.
“With past offices, due to the size or retail component of the space, it didn’t allow an office of the future concept,” said Malin. “We took a hard look at our business plan and what we were doing and where were going. We’re really just trying to enhance every angle of what they’re daily life should be like.”
The firm is planning to open the office for business the first week of December. “It’s going to be the latest and the greatest and we’re really excited about it,” said Malin.
