SL Green Realty refinances 100 Church St. for $230 million - financed by Wells Fargo

According to SL Green Realty Corp., the city of New York has renewed its lease covering 372,520 s/f for offices of the law division at 100 Church St., the 21-story, 1.05 million s/f building located in downtown Manhattan. The 20-year lease renewal commences November 2013 covering floors 2-6, 20 and a portion of the building's concourse level. The company has also refinanced the property with a new $230 million, 10-year loan bearing interest at a rate of 4.675%. Proceeds from the financing, which was provided by Wells Fargo Bank, will be used for general corporate purposes. CB Richard Ellis's Michael Geoghegan and John Morrill represented the city of New York in the transaction. Caroline Silk, Esq. represented the City of New York in-house, while Peter Strauss, Esq. and Christopher Smith, Esq. of Shearman & Sterling acted on behalf of SL Green. "We are delighted to have the city of New York as our anchor tenant. The city's decision to extend its commitment is testament to the quality of our recently completed redevelopment of 100 Church St.," said Steven Durels, executive vice president and director of leasing and real property for SL Green. "This early renewal is consistent with our firm's proactive management of future lease expirations which has led to consistently high portfolio occupancy," said Durels. SL Green acquired the building in 2010 after it had been 56% vacant for over 5 years. A comprehensive redevelopment of the property, which was completed in 2011, included a new lobby, windows, infrastructure upgrades, new roofs and retail repositioning. Building occupancy is now 82% and tenants, in addition to the city of New York, include HealthFirst, Niche Media, Interactive Data Corp., Centerline Capital Group and the State of New York. SL Green Realty Corp., New York City's largest office landlord, is the only fully integrated real estate investment trust, or REIT, that is focused primarily on acquiring, managing and maximizing value of Manhattan commercial properties. As of March 31, 2012, SL Green owned interests in 70 Manhattan properties totaling more than 39.0 million square feet. This included ownership interests in 27.3 million square feet of commercial properties and debt and preferred equity investments secured by 11.7 million square feet of properties. In addition to its Manhattan investments, SL Green holds ownership interests in 32 suburban assets totaling 6.9 million square feet in Brooklyn, Queens, Long Island, Westchester County, Connecticut and New Jersey, along with four development properties in the suburbs encompassing approximately 0.5 million square feet.