Ofer Brothers to develop Manhattan luxury project

The New York Post published initial details yesterday of plans by Eyal Ofer to develop a luxury residential project in a prestigious section of Manhattan in partnership with American investor Goldman Sachs.

The project, which will include two apartment towers of 19 and 50 stories, will replace the Mayflower Hotel. The project, bordered by Central Park West, Broadway, 61st and 62nd Streets, is said to be one of the most luxurious and expensive in Manhattan.

The plans call for building 250-280 residential units, averaging 2,100 square feet per apartment. Some 88,000 square feet of stores will occupy the bottom four floors. The target occupancy date is late 2007. Architectural firm Cesar Pelli and Associates is designing the project.

Ofer, the son of Sammy Ofer, one of the owners of The Israel Corporation, Zim, and United Mizrahi Bank, bought the Mayflower last summer, along with an adjacent empty lot, with managing partners Arthur and Lie Zeckendorf of Goldman Sachs' Whitehall Fund for $401 million. The group closed the hotel and has now demolished it.

The partners paid top dollar, just as real estate magnate Yitzhak Tshuva did to acquire the Plaza Hotel on Fifth Avenue. New York real estate sources told Haaretz that none other than Tshuva had expressed interest in picking up the Mayflower property prior to Ofer. The sources claim that Ofer swiped the deal from under Tshuva's nose, but his family denied the allegation.

Razing the Mayflower, whose aura had faded since falling on hard times, drew much less attention than Tshuva has faced in his efforts to level the Plaza, still considered a wondrous and important landmark.

	The Central Park West site Eyal Ofer apparently snatched from Yitzhak Tshuva, who also wants to raze the Plaza Hotel.
	Photo by: Haim Handwerker