Ginsburg Development Cos. is entering the growing luxury rental apartment sector in White Plains. The company has bought the 124-unit luxury apartment building at 34 S. Lexington Ave., known as Halstead White Plains Metro North.
The Valhalla-based development group led by Martin Ginsburg paid $35.25 million for the 12-story building last week. The deal was announced by Avison Young, a commercial real estate services firm that arranged a $28.64 million acquisition loan for Ginsburg Development Cos.
Ginsburg told the Business Journal Monday that the building offered a chance to bring the company’s brand into White Plains.
“It”™s got a great location,” he added. “We like the style of the building, it was completely renovated and it”™s really in excellent shape. It’s also right near the railroad station and convenient to everything in downtown.”
Ginsburg bought the building from DSF Group, a Boston-area real estate investment firm that picked up the property in 2013 for $34 million. The firm converted the building from extended-stay corporate apartments to luxury rentals shortly after its purchase.
Ginsburg Development Cos. will make further renovations and change the building’s name, but Ginsburg said there is no set timeline on when that will happen.
The building is less than a mile from the city’s Metro-North rail station. Its amenities include a rooftop terrace, 24-hour fitness center and new finishes in the apartments such as granite countertops and wood flooring. The building’s management, Buzzuto Management Co., lists studios starting at $2,175, one-bedrooms at $2,515 and two-bedrooms at $3,450.
White Plains has drawn significant interest from apartment developers in the blocks around its train station. The city recently studied and finalized a plan for a transit district in the area that would open up property parcels for possible mixed-use development. Already under construction is 55 Bank St., a $250 million, 561-unit apartment building that will be a block over from Halstead White Plains. Also nearby, the owners of the decades-old White Plains Mall on Hamilton Avenue near the train station have proposed a mixed-use makeover that includes a craft food hall, public space and 600 apartments units. Add to that two new loft apartment buildings that have been approved along the mostly industrial Westmoreland Avenue.
Ginsburg said he had been watching new development around the train station with interest. He called White Plains a “destination place.”
“We’re very focused on transit-oriented development,” Ginsburg said. “New York City is the Big Apple here, and I think White Plains is becoming its own little apple as well.”
Ginsburg Development Cos. has started or completed construction on a series of luxury apartment developments in the last three years. In November, the development group held a topping off ceremony for its $100 million River Tides at Greystone luxury apartment project in Yonkers. The group has recently opened the $65 million, 118-unit Harbor Square apartment building in Ossining, and the $35 million, 66-unit The Lofts on Saw Mill River apartment complex in Hastings-on-Hudson. Ginsburg has also broken ground on another luxury Yonkers development: the $21 million 1177@Greystone, also on Warburton Avenue.
DSF Group’s other Westchester properties include the 40-story Halstead New Rochelle building. In September, the company entered into a contract to buy La Rochelle, a 25-story tower with 412 apartments at 255 Huguenot St in downtown New Rochelle.
