Fitch Ratings downgraded 90 Fifth Ave. after the RFR-owned office building near Union Square missed a tax payment.
Ratings for a security that holds the building’s $102 million mortgage were lowered by two notches to highly speculative B and CCC, Fitch said in a report Monday. Additional downgrades are possible unless building performance stabilizes, the ratings firm said.
Located at the corner of 14th Street and built in 1903, 90 Fifth Ave. is a 140,000 square-foot building grappling with rising vacancy rates and declining cash flow, a common problem among older Manhattan office buildings. Its anchor tenant, the struggling residential real estate broker Compass, is subleasing space and another tenant, Republic First Bancorp, was seized by the federal government in April and sold to Pennsylvania-based Fulton Financial Corp.
Last summer, 90 Fifth didn’t pay its $1.6 million property tax bill, according to records with the city Department of Finance. The bill, plus more than $100,000 in past-due charges, was paid in full on February 13. In March, the mortgage for 90 Fifth was sent to special servicing, where troubled loans get close attention. The loan matures in 2027.
RFR acquired 90 Fifth in 2001 for $28 million, according to city records. The landlord renovated the building about a decade ago and bond rater KBRA says the property’s estimated value is $73 million. RFR, which is run by developers Aby Rosen and Michael Fuchs, owns the Chrysler Building and Seagram Building, among other Manhattan properties. It declined to comment.
Aaron Elstein , 2024-06-04 19:16:10
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