Empire State Realty Trust has agreed to sell its 22-story office tower at 1359 Broadway to Thor Equities for $218 million, a deal that would close within one or two months and mark yet another Manhattan office building shed by the REIT this year. The 486,000-square-foot property sits two blocks north of Herald Square and was on the market for only about a month before the sale came together, though the transaction is not yet official.
As reported by Commercial Observer, Empire State Realty Trust was represented in the deal by Newmark, with a team that included Doug Harmon, Adam Spies, Marcella Fasulo, Adam Doneger, Josh King and Avery Silverstein. Thor Equities, led by principal Joe Sitt, is no stranger to the corridor — the firm purchased the 58,000-square-foot office and retail building at 1165 Broadway, previously owned by Michael Haddad, for $56 million in March 2026. According to GlobeNewswire, that NoMad property came fully leased with tenants including Christian Louboutin and Aesop.
Per The Real Deal, the $218 million price tag works out to roughly $448 per square foot, coming in just below the roughly $225 million, or $462 per square foot, ESRT had been seeking when it put the building on the market earlier this summer. Notably, the outlet reports that 1359 Broadway is being sold free of encumbering debt, giving Thor a clean fee-simple asset at a moment when debt maturities across Manhattan office buildings have slowed other transactions.
A Tower Full Of Fresh Leases
The building's leasing momentum has been building even as ESRT prepared to sell it. The tower recently signed leases with Braven and SLCE Architects, according to the seed reporting, while glass and office wall system manufacturer Infinium Wall Systems signed a 13-year lease for 30,017 square feet in July to serve as its New York flagship. The building's retail portion includes Wolfgang's Steakhouse and Wokuni.
The tenant roster's anchor remains fertility benefits company Progyny, which occupies 70,573 square feet across three full floors after expanding its headquarters in March 2022, per a release from the company at the time. Progyny originally entered the building through a sublease before signing direct long-term leases with ESRT. As of July 2026, 1359 Broadway was 95 percent occupied — an occupancy rate that helps explain why the tower moved so quickly once it hit the market.
Part Of A Broader ESRT Pullback
The sale fits into a wider pattern for Empire State Realty Trust, which has been steadily rotating out of traditional office space in favor of retail and residential holdings. The company's $386 million purchase of SoHo's Scholastic Building in December 2025 and a $110 million ground lease acquisition under 111 West 33rd Street and 1400 Broadway in June 2026 both point in the same direction, the article notes. ESRT CEO Anthony Malkin has actively reallocated capital toward higher-performing retail and multifamily assets, according to the same account.
1359 Broadway is not the only office tower ESRT has moved this year. In April, the REIT entered a contract to sell its 540,000-square-foot building at 250 West 57th Street to Namdar Realty Group for $280 million, or $518 per square foot — a $70 million discount off its original $350 million ask, as detailed by Commercial Observer in Hoodline's earlier coverage. Bargain-focused buyers like Namdar have been stepping in to acquire older Midtown office towers, per that outlet's reporting.
Earnings Pressure Behind The Selloff
Built in 1924, 1359 Broadway entered ESRT's public portfolio during the REIT's initial public offering in October 2013, when its Garment District holdings were marketed as a value alternative for tech, advertising and media tenants, according to The Real Deal's 2013 reporting. Now, more than a decade later, corporate financial pressure appears to be adding urgency to the sell-off. ESRT's commercial portfolio maintained a 94.9 percent leased rate in the second quarter of 2026, but a 28.5 percent year-over-year decline in visitation at the Empire State Building Observation Deck contributed to a quarterly net loss of $0.15 per share, according to a report from TradingView that also notes the REIT trimmed its full-year funds-from-operations outlook. That same report attributes the observatory's revenue decline to lower international tourism and weaker attraction pass sales.
The disposition also lands amid a broader shift in the Midtown office market. Asking rents there averaged $84.99 per square foot in the second quarter of 2026, while citywide commercial office vacancy fell 220 basis points year-over-year to 13.5 percent, according to figures reported by GlobeSt.com. A flight to modernized, well-located space has helped sustain leasing demand in select Midtown buildings even as older office stock continues to change hands at a discount.
