The city’s hottest real estate drama appears to have finally come to a close.
Two auctions, one lawsuit and a scandalous news cycle later — and the triangle-shaped Flatiron Building has found a new owner in … some of its former owners.
In March, an only-in-New-York industry epic began when the 121-year-old property went up for court-ordered auction and was won by a mysterious 31-year-old to the tune of $190 million.
That mystery man, Jacob Garlick, then failed to pay any of the enormous sum he’d promised, though, and the skyscraper was sent back to the auction block Tuesday for the second time in two months.
Garlick is now being sued by the former deed holders for making a “fraudulent bid” to get the small trust he represents “15 minutes of fame,” according to the allegations.
This time, the winner was far from an unknown outsider but a group led by majority building stakeholder Jeff Gural of GFP Real Estate, who beat four other contenders with their $161 million winning bid, Crain’s reported.
The winning group also included ABS Real Estate Partners and Sorgente Group.
Gural and other co-owners were forced to auction off the address after reaching a stalemate with Nathan Silverstein, who owned 25% of the steel-framed structure until the first auction, and who could not come to an agreement on how to manage the pricey piece of property.
“I feel good, truthfully,” Gural said after the gavel formalized his repossession of the former Fuller Building yesterday afternoon, according to Crain’s. “I really didn’t know how it would all turn out.”
And thus, a former part deed-sharer has become the full one, Gural and company having now functionally acquired the 25% stake previously held by Silverstein.
The Real Deal reported that Garlick was nowhere in sight at the second auction, which took place outside the New York County courthouse.