Downtown is getting rubbed, pinned and pricked.
The Pacific College of Oriental Medicine is moving from Noho to downtown in yet another transaction fueled by rents rising so much in Midtown South.
The move by the college to the hot downtown area could save the institution of higher learning about 40 percent on its rents — or more than $20 per square foot.
Now that is smart thinking.
California-based PCOM signed a lease for 42,000 square feet at 110 William St., where they will move from 915 Broadway.
The 15-year lease includes the 19th floor and a piece of the ground floor and had an asking rent in the low $30s per foot.
The asking rent in Noho was in the $50s-per-foot range.
Mark Weiss, Robert Eisenberg and Nick Berger of Newmark Grubb Knight Frank represented the school, which teaches Asian medicinal practices, including massage and acupuncture.
The space has views of the Brooklyn Bridge and will be custom-designed.
Jonathan Dean of Swig Equities represented owner Kent Swig in-house.
Even better, the deal now brings the building to 99-percent leased.
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That large pricing differential between downtown and Midtown is bringing more companies south, brokers say.
“I’m turning into a downtown broker,” joked Jonathan Schifrin of Transwestern, who is seeking spaces for his Midtown South clients that are being priced out of their renewals.
“Buildings are changing hands for large numbers, and owners need to boost rents to justify the high purchase prices,” Schifrin explained of some of the increases, thus driving out tenants that have spent decades in Midtown South.
Downtown, he added, there are a multitude of Class A buildings with better systems and services that can be had for much lower rents — most times less than $40 per square foot.
Schifrin was among the many paddlers who kayaked up the East River with the Young Men’s/Women’s Real Estate Association in July. We joined the group to paddle to Barretto Point Park’s floating pool in the Bronx and then back to the Gowanus Dredgers Canoe Club in Brooklyn. The club is opposite the TF Cornerstone residential towers now rising and being rented nearby in Long Island City.
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Of course, there are still tenants who want or need to be in high-traffic retail locations in Midtown.
That’s why two “Law & Order” alums are keeping the peace by making up. That is, they will be making up customers in their new Soho salon concept.
Former show makeup department head Rebecca Perkins and actress Stephanie March, who played ADA Alexandra Cabot on “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit,” have joined to form Rouge NYC.
The duo signed a lease for 700 square feet at 130 Thompson St. between Houston and Prince streets, where Perkins will oversee clients getting full-on actress-style makeovers while March — married to chef Bobby Flay — will handle the management.
Jordan Cohn and Jacqueline Klinger of SCG Retail did the detective work to ferret out the location, which was formerly a dry cleaner. Building owner Standard Realty was repped by Robert Carbonara of First Allied Properties. The asking rent was $200 per square foot.
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The Development Corporation for Israel, a broker-dealer that underwrites securities issued by the state of Israel in the US, is moving north on Lexington Avenue from 575 to 641, owned by Rudin Management.
The 15-year lease is for the entire 9th floor of 25,000 square feet. The 32-story, 400,000-square-foot building sits on the northeast corner of East 54th Street.
James Emden of Colliers International represented the tenant, which will move in 2014.
Robert Steinman of Rudin Management Company represented the building’s ownership in-house on the deal, which had an asking rent of $55 a square foot.
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Finally, we mourn the loss of Alliance for Downtown’s CEO Liz Berger, who died Monday of pancreatic cancer just two days after turning 53. She was a lovely, kind and street-smart leader who leaves a husband and young children. RIP.