S. wrote twice back in the spring and I never got on it: “I live across the street from 250 Church and was wondering why the work has stopped at that building? I was hoping that once completed it would be nice to look at a nice building. I saw the proposed rendering and it looked great.”

Well, The Real Deal has the answer.

This was a nosy neighbor in May 2022, when we learned that the 17-story office building was acquired by Columbia Property Trust in late 2019; the city’s Human Resources Administration and the Department of Social Services moved to Brooklyn. And ever since then it has had a sidewalk bridge along Church, which as we all know a total drag. Plans conceived by the late Rafael Viñoly for a new facade seemed to be moving forward just a year ago.

A few years before that, in 2017, the building’s then-owner had filed plans to convert it to a 107-unit residential building. But those were scrapped when the sale went through to Columbia Property Trust and boutique office was now on the table.

City records show there was a transfer of the property in 2021, among a group of six other properties in Chelsea and Midtown, worth $1.4 BILLION (I’ve never seen a number in the billions on ACRIS — it took me a minute to read it properly) and the press agent for Columbia Property Trust confirmed that the company owned 250 Church.

But now, according to The Real Deal, Columbia Property Trust is looking to sell the 1940s-era office building, which is now called 101 Franklin, pitching it as a good candidate for a condominium or rental conversion. The company, “is looking for a price around $115 million, a source familiar with the offering told The Real Deal. That’s roughly 40 percent less than the $205.5 million Columbia paid to buy the building four years ago.”

This is all clearly a result of the office market in the city right now, which of course is dismal. Makes me think I should follow up on the sweet little garage that is 56 N. Moore and that might also be for sale after a conversion to boutique commercial never happened…