Africa Israel To Buy MetLife Building

Africa Israel Investments Ltd., Israeli billionaire Lev Leviev's property company, agreed to buy the clock tower portion of MetLife Inc.'s former New York headquarters for $200 million, its third purchase of a Manhattan landmark in three months.

Africa Israel plans to invest an additional $110 million in the 41-story, 267,000-square-foot building to convert it into luxury apartments, the company said in a statement to the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange yesterday. SL Green Realty Corp., the seller, acknowledged the deal in a separate statement.

Israeli property companies have been buying real estate abroad, seeking new sources of revenue. Last month, Africa Israel said it bought Manhattan's New York Times building for $525 million, and in March it became a 50% partner in the purchase of the Apthorp Apartments on Manhattan's Upper West Side.

"It's a fabulous building," the executive vice president of Stribling & Associates, Bruce Ehrmann, said. "This building could set a market all by itself."