Oakdale, NY A&G Realty Partners and Madison Hawk have been retained to manage the sale of two properties formerly occupied by Dowling College in Oakdale and Brookhaven. Dowling plans to sell two Suffolk County properties through two separate sealed bid sales as part of its Chapter 11 Bankruptcy filing.
A&G Realty and Madison Hawk are currently accepting bids for the 25-acre waterfront campus in Oakdale which houses six buildings including the former W.K. Vanderbilt Estate.
The sealed bid deadline for the Oakdale property will be set by the Court. The firms will subsequently sell a 101-acre Brookhaven location in Shirley in the first quarter of 2017.
The announcement of the sale follows Dowling’s filing today of Chapter 11 in the United States Bankruptcy Court in the Eastern District of New York, case number 16-75545.
“This unfortunately is the final chapter of a college that has enriched the college experience of thousands of students on Long Island for more than 50 years,” said chief restructuring officer Robert Rosenfeld, whose firm RSR Consulting is managing the dissolution of the Dowling College estate. “We are winding down the estate through an orderly liquidation which is a necessary step to maximize the recovery for all creditors. We are pleased to have two well-respected and experienced firms in A&G Realty and Madison Hawk to oversee the sale of these prime assets and assist us in this strategic plan.”
Dowling College’s Oakdale campus is situated on the land of the former W.K. Vanderbilt Estate on the Connetquot River, with immediate access to the Nicoll Bay. The campus operated under a special permit allowing for College/Educational use and is zoned Residence AA Single-Family Dwelling. The property includes over 200,000 s/f in six educational, administrative and student housing buildings.
“The Dowling campus in Oakdale sits on 25 pristine waterfront acres and offers one of the most unique redevelopment opportunities on the South Shore of Long Island,” said Andy Graiser, co-founder and co-president of A&G Realty. “The property is already zoned residential and is ideal for continued use as an educational institution or redevelopment into residential or other uses. Assets like these rarely become available.”
“There’s been tremendous interest in the campuses since the school ceased operations,” said Jeff Hubbard, president of Madison Hawk. “Despite the Chapter 11 proceedings and wind-down of Dowling’s operations, we have been afforded ample time to sell the properties and proposed an orderly sealed bid format to maximize their value as opposed to simply conducting a liquidation sale.”
The Brookhaven property is expected to be offered in the first quarter of 2017. The 101 acre property, which was home to the college’s aviation program, is located on the William Floyd Parkway in Shirley and includes an athletic complex, a two-story, 65,000 s/f building; and a 10,000 s/f airplane hangar with runway access to Brookhaven Airport, all of which provides immediate income potential to developers. The Brookhaven campus has undergone millions of dollars of infrastructure improvements, greatly reducing development costs to a buyer.
“The Brookhaven location is considered one of the most diverse development sites on all of Long Island with opportunities for residential, education, medical, health-related, senior housing, office, retail, etc.,” Graiser said.