Historic building in Kensington sells for $5.6M

The Charles Schober Co. building, an historic 10-story structure at 2000-2034 N. 2nd St. in the Kensington neighborhood of Philadelphia, has sold for $5.6 million — a tad above the asking price — to a local developer who has plans for a residential project.

The 86,950-square-foot building was sold by a partnership involving the Schober family, who operated a wholesale wicker furniture business from the property since buying it in 1968. The structure was built in 1922 by the Gotham Silk Hosiery Co., a New York company that expanded its manufacturing operations to Philadelphia, according to a nomination form to have the building listed on the National Register of Historic Places, which it ultimately was.

The hosiery company used the building until the end of World War II. The property eventually traded hands and was later owned by the Estate of Isaac Lodge and Martin and Joseph Lodge until Schober acquired it.

Family members involved in the Schober wicker business, which was established in 1892, decided a couple of years ago that it was time to sell the property, said Jack Depaul, a broker with MPN Realty Inc., who along with colleague Justin Kaplan, sold the building on their behalf. At the time, the property was being used to warehouse the company’s wicker furniture and other related products.

The building was put up for sale in the winter of 2016 with an asking price of $5.5 million. “We put it on the market and there was a frenzy,” Depaul said “It’s a landmark property and we had every major developer in the city looking at it.”

Ten offers were made on the property but just four or five of them were significant and considered, Kaplan said. The brokers were hoping to have a “strong buyer” who would use the existing building and have a development plan that would work with the neighborhood and existing structure, which is in good condition, Depaul said. They ended up finding that in Jim Maransky’s E. Built Inc., a Philadelphia real estate company.

E. Built put the property under agreement and took it through the development approval process, which created a lag between the time the property was put up for sale and when it ultimately closed. Plans involve building 78 residential units in the existing structure and constructing a four-story building on an existing parking lot that will have 52 units and a dozen townhouses. Maransky declined to comment at this time. The transaction closed Nov. 14.