Sources inform ''Globes'' that Gindi Investments 1 Ltd. (TASE: GIND.B1) held preliminary talks with Elad Israel Residences Ltd. (formerly Dankner Investments), controlled by Yitzhak Tshuva through Delek Real Estate Ltd. (TASE: DLKR), to buy the Bezalel Market site in central Tel Aviv for NIS 107 million.
However, sources close to the talks told "Globes" that Elad Israel wants to sell 50% of the property, but that Gindi Investments wants to buy all of it. Another source told Globes" today that Elad Israel is also in talks with other parties for the sale of half of the property.
In late 2005, Dankner Investments won the tender for the Bezalel Market lot with a bid of $6 million (NIS 28 million at the time). The lot's value has almost quadrupled within five years. However, it should be noted that the terms of the tender stipulate that the tender had to remove stalls that obtained protected tenant status. The tender also stipulated that the project was to be built within three and a half years.
One of the problems delaying the Bezalel Market project is objections by neighbors. In August 2010, they succeeded in reducing the height of the residential buildings planned for the site, in line with the new Urban Building Plan (UBP) approved by the Tel Aviv Local Planning and Building Commission. The UBP reduced the number of floors from sixteen to eight for the building planned for the corner of Hamaccabi Street and Tchernichovsky Street, and reduced the number of floors for the building planned on Bethlehem Street from ten to nine.
The UBP also increased the number of apartments in the project to 160 from 120, and set the mix of apartment sizes, so that one third of the apartments will be small (56-60 square meters each, not including the protected room), one third will be mid-sized (65-70 square meters), and one third will be large apartments (more than 80 square meters).
If Gindi Investments becomes a partner in the Bezalel Market project, it will become the second market in Tel Aviv on which the company is building a residential project. East of Bezalel Market, the company is building the well-publicized Gindi Tel Aviv project on the site of the old wholesale market.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on November 22, 2010
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