Besen & Associates is expecting offers north of $48 million for The Diamond Offering, commonly referred to as 1200 Avenue of the Americas, for which the investment sale boutique has been appointment exclusive sales agent.

1200 Avenue of the Americas, is a 6-story elevator office building with a diamond exchange located on the high traffic corner of 47th Street and Avenue of the Americas in the heart of Manhattan's Diamond District.

Michael Besen, founder and president of Besen & Associates, said, "We anticipate a lot of interest for the property, which has not had an outright sale in over 20 years.

It's not every day that one of the four prime corners of the Diamond District come on the market. Inquiries have already started coming in from national and international markets."

According to Amit Doshi, executive broker at Besen who is spearheading the sale, "1200 Avenue of the Americas has a ground floor retail space and one and a half stories of office space that are vacant, which make it an interesting play for a diamond/jeweler business to acquire the asset as its corporate headquarters in lieu of paying the high rents commanded by the diamond district." Matthew Slonim, the head of investment analysis at Besen & Associates, rationalizes, "If you are a player in the diamond industry, you want to be in densely populated zoned Diamond District. Thus, demand for space is quite inelastic and landlords can command high rents on a relative basis as evidenced by recent leasing activity at rates exceeding $55 per square foot for class "B" office space and exceeding $1,000 per square foot for retail space along the diamond corridor."

1200 Avenue of the Americas with 75 feet of frontage on Avenue of the Americas generates its revenue from retail, office, the garden penthouse and a cell tower.

Slonim said, "1200 Sixth Avenue is a unique asset not only due to its diverse existing revenue stream, but also due to its future potential income that may be realized from expanding the diamond exchange, utilizing or selling its 21,900 s/f of air rights. In addition, the building's heavy traffic and visibility up Sixth Avenue makes it a prime candidate to host and sell signage or advertisements if an interior glass banner is built as was done across the street from the building."

Similarly, many other buildings on the 47th Street corridor also have less square footage than the C6 zoning permits and as a result developers and speculators are quietly looking to create assemblages for future development.

Doshi commented, "Evidence of the uniqueness of the asset is reflective of the early interest from a variety of suitors for the asset."