West Side Rag »Excelsior Hotel on West 81st Sold for Nearly $ 80 Million; New owner known for “Pricey Rentals”

Posted 29 December 2021 at 10:00 by Carol Tannenhauser

Scaffolding hailed Excelsior Hotel for years.

By Carol Tannenhauser

The Excelsior Hotel, at 45 West 81st Street, has been sold for nearly $ 80 million to Emmut Properties, “a developer that specializes in converting buildings into expensive rental housing,”[ads1]; according to the New York Post on Tuesday. The seller was Harry Krakowski.

The building is a landmark, originally opened as a residential hotel in 1922, under the name The Hotel Standish Hall. “It was Excelsior once in the 1950s,” according to Overnight New York. “Until the late 1990s, it was a nice budget hotel with layers of old paint on the walls, simple furniture and $ 75 rooms. It also had a wonderful old-fashioned coffee shop ($ 2.25 for pie and coffee) overseen by a hostess who looked like Tallulah Bankhead and wore evening dresses and marabouboas as they seated jean-clad guests for bagels and eggs. The hotel underwent a radical renovation in 1997, which moved it up to the market and increased the level of comfort …. “

Excelsior was a popular place to stay during the Thanksgiving holiday, due to its location on West 81st Street, one of the blocks where the balloons for the annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade are inflated. Excelsior was also once home to the Latin restaurant Calle Ocho, which opened there in 1998. Calle Ocho eventually moved to 2756 Broadway, at 106th Street.

From around 2016, The Excelsior was used by the city to house families who experienced homelessness. In August 2016, the WSR reported [the City] “rent some rooms at this commercial hotel to help meet its legal obligation to provide shelter to homeless New Yorkers who would otherwise be turned out on the streets. Although this hotel will not be turned into a homeless shelter, DHS 24 offers / 7 on-site security and social services for families during their stay there. ”

According to Norway Post, the previous owner was facing financial problems that led to the sale of the hotel. “Despite being closed, the 133,000-square-foot, 215-room hotel has a $ 1.3 million city tax bill – with half of what is due on January 1. And because Excelsior failed to reopen by November 1 “is called a new city law. for the previous owner, Harry Krakowski, to pay a severance pay of $ 500 per week for 26 weeks for each of his employees.”