2014 Brooklyn development to watch: 19 Kent Ave.

Eye On Real Estate

January 1, 2014 By Lore Croghan Brooklyn Daily Eagle

Spec office construction is planned for this site. Eagle photos by Lore Croghan

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Residential projects are percolating all over Williamsburg. But the development at 19 Kent Ave. promises to be something special – it’s going to be Brooklyn’s first new-from-the-ground-up speculative office building since World War II.

Toby Moskovits, the CEO of Heritage Equity Partners, said at a November real estate roundtable at the Brooklyn Historical Society her goal is to build a “Brooklyn-style technology office park” at this centrally-located site.

(How central? Hipster hot spots Brooklyn Brewery and Brooklyn Bowl are a half-block away.)

The building will have a community area with a food court, she said, and the offices will have terraces.

She’ll look for two anchor tenants of 50,000 square feet each; a couple business incubators have approached her firm about the project.

A city Buildings Department filing indicates plans for a nine-story, 384,000-square-foot building with offices, retail and a community facility – plus enclosed parking for 120 vehicles.

Currently the full-block site bordered by Kent and Wythe Avenues and N. 12th and N. 13th Streets is covered by low-rise brick buildings and open lots where cranes are parked. Construction-equipment company Sunbelt Rentals occupies the property but will move to Maspeth, Queens when demolition time rolls around, employees there told Eye on Real Estate.

Heritage Equity Partners bought the site with investment partners in 2012 for $31.75 million, city records indicate.