By Al Barbarino
MKF Group hopes to fill the hole left by H&H bagels.
The investment management firm acquired the defunct bagel shop’s former headquarters at 639 West 46th Street with an $11 million bid at a bankruptcy hearing on Thursday.
“It’s a great opportunity for somebody who wants a full building presence with highway visibility,” said Adam J. Smith, MKF’s managing director of real estate.
H&H Bagels was evicted from the location last month, following bankruptcies and evictions at their operations in the Upper West Side and Secaucus, N.J. last year. The Midtown West location housed their manufacturing plant and a small retail space. Two existing tenants without leases who currently occupy about half of the two-story building’s 25,000 square feet will also move out, Smith said.
The roughly 12,600-square-foot site is located by the West Side Highway – near the Intrepid Sea, Air and space Museum – and is zoned for commercial, manufacturing or industrial use, according to a statement from the seller, GA Keen Realty Advisors, LLC.
“As we expected, there was a lot of interest in the property,” said Mathew Bordwin, co-president of GA Keen, in the statement, adding that the bid was set at $10.4 million. “It’s going to provide the buyer with an excellent redevelopment opportunity.”
In April 2011, MKF purchased the second mortgage for the building and conducted a foreclosure which was later stayed by the debtor. The judge lifted the stay and appointed Yann Geron, an attorney at Fox Rothschild LLP, as the Chapter 7 trustee on behalf of the owner, Third Toro Family Limited Partnership.
In November 2011, Geron filed a stalking horse contract to sell the property for $10 million and hired GA Keen to negotiate the contract and market the property. MKF became the bidder, pursuant to a court order on December 1, 2011 and a subsequent bankruptcy auction – at which point MKF sealed the deal, paying $11 million cash.
MKF develops, owns and manages an international portfolio of Class A residential and retail properties.