Moni Shababo at a Bentley event with guests and the Empire State Building
A Lebanese-born, Brazil-based billionaire has told The Real Deal that he is setting his sights on New York, and expects to bid on prime retail space in Manhattan as well as larger, high-profile trophy assets.
In a telephone interview, Moni Shababo talked about his intention to park at least $100 million in New York real estate this year. He is focusing on retail, he said, because he believes prime retail assets have the greatest potential for value appreciation in the next several years.
Though relatively new to New York, the Brazil-based Shababo has already invested in several retail deals so far this year — at 711 Madison Avenue, 169 Spring Street, 138 Spring Street and 113 Spring Street. For his personal investments, Shababo is working exclusively with local family-run real estate investment firm Sitt Asset Management, headed by brothers Ralph, Eddie and David Sitt.
Shababo has invested about $10 million in deals with Sitt, sources at the company said. Two wrapped up this spring were the 711 Madison Avenue and the 138 Spring Street buys; a source at Sitt credited the company’s recent buying spree in part to the Brazilian investor.
The Sao Paulo-based mogul is also turning to larger, trophy assets on behalf of his family in Brazil, he said, and made a bid on the Empire State Building of $2.3 billion, following other offers from such heavy hitters as Thor Equities’ Joseph Sitt and investor Rubin Schron, whom Shababo has invested with. He told TRD that he did not receive a response to his offer, which could not be verified.
Sitt Asset Management is not the only local investor bullish on retail deals in neighborhoods such as Soho and the Upper East Side.
Retail developers Bobby Cayre, Jeff Sutton, Joseph Sitt and the Adjmi family are planning to redevelop a retail property at 529 Broadway, which they acquired in December for a Soho record of $147.9 million, into a six-story retail box, The Real Deal previously reported, and Imperium Capital’s Sam Schneider and Daniel Glaser partnered with Centurion Realty and ASB Real Estate to buy the retail condominium at the base of 40 Mercer Street for $80 million earlier this month.
CORRECTION: A previous version of this story noted that Shababo had links to the Brazil-based Safra banking family. Those connections could not be verified and a spokesperson for Joseph Safra said Safra had never heard of Shababo.