Philadelphia property owner Richard Basciano has now sold
off his entire real estate portfolio in Center City, opening a frontier for
development along what had long been a blighted stretch of sex shops, empty
buildings, and vacant land.
Basciano's STB Investments Corp. has sold nearly an acre
along West Market Street - including the site of Center City's last porn
theater - since June to Brandywine Realty Trust, Parkway Corp. and PMC Property
Group or their affiliates, according to city records and company officials.
The transactions account for all the land held by STB as
of May, according to a database of city property records compiled by
Philly.com. Included are a large portion of the 2100 block of Market Street,
two strips of vacant land on Market's 2200 block, and a building on the 2300
block.
Basciano - once dubbed "the undisputed king of Times
Square porn" by the New York Times - had long been the dominant landlord
along the seedy strip of West Market Street that included the Forum Theater
XXX-movie house and Les Gals sex shop.
As recently as late 2012, Basciano said he was looking
for a developer - and seeking city assistance - to build up the properties.
He stopped pushing those development plans after June
2013, when a building on one of his Market Street properties collapsed,
flattening an adjacent Salvation Army thrift shop and killing six people and
injuring 13.
With the properties in the hands of established local
developers, the stage may be set for a rebirth of the vital commercial
corridor, said Paul Levy, president and CEO of the Center City District.
"People have been trying to acquire those parcels
for 15 or 16 years," said Levy. "The notion that that the whole area
could become a mixed-use live-work area and really connect together Center City
and University City is the huge opportunity here."
Attorney Robert Mongeluzzi, who represents plaintiffs in
the 2013 building collapse, said in a statement that his team was "made
aware of these sales before they occurred pursuant to an agreement . . .
regarding the disposition of those properties."
Basciano's lawyer, Richard Sprague, said through an
assistant that his client sold the properties because the market was favorable
to do so.
Property prices in Philadelphia are, in many cases,
hitting record highs, said Michael Barmash, a senior vice president at Colliers
International, a commercial real estate services firm.
"New watermarks are being established," Barmash
said. "It seems that every vacant piece of ground is being purchased or
rehabbed."
Parkway Corp., which operates parking lots throughout the
city on land it often has earmarked for development, paid Basciano $2 million
in June for 5,250 square feet of vacant land on the 2200 block of Market
Street, according to records filed with the city. Basciano had bought that land
for $1.03 million in 1994.
In another of the Market Street deals, PMC Property Group
and investment firm Lubert-Adler paid $3.25 million for a three-story building
Basciano bought for just over $1 million in 1994.
The price in Basciano's biggest recent deal, the sale to
Brandywine Realty Trust of about 37,000 square feet - including the site of the
2013 building collapse - has not yet been recorded with the city. The developer
paid Basciano $17 million in April for a parking structure on East Market
Street he had purchased for $6.6 million in 1997.
Aside from cashing in on a hot market, the 89-year-old
Basciano may be thinking about damages he may yet have to pay plaintiffs in the
2013 collapse, though he also could be planning for the disposition of his
estate, Barmash said.
"The market and the price he can get and his age are
the main things, I would guess," Barmash said. "You certainly want to
liquidate what you have when you're that age."
Source: Philly.com
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