The Church of Scientology bought a big chunk of East 125th Street in the past decade but the buildings still show no signs of life today. The first transaction was back in 2003 when the 33,000 square foot loft building at 220 East 125th Street was purchased for $3.45 million (top photo). This space was apparently the planned new site for the church uptown and three more properties was bought up a couple of buildings east in 2007. The total sales for the properties at 228-232 East 125th Street (second photo) totaled $10.2 million and the satellite sites would serve as community centers for the church. Absolutely nothing has happened to these buildings since their purchase so either the church has been hit by the financial crises or maybe they are deciding to make a flip and just sit on the properties until things get better. Does anyone have any idea what happened here? The closest subway to this location is the 4,5,6 at East 125th Street. Photos by Ulysses
There was an interesting article in the Times yesterday that stated that their membership is down and they are awash in grandious real estate ventures.
ReplyDelete116th Street east of Fifth now has a building with a Scientology sign on it. I don’t remember having seen it before
They had a smaller building on that side of East Harlem which they apparently outgrew and that is why they started buying up more property.
ReplyDeleteThere is a nice database of Scientology's real estate holdings and property values at xenu-directory.net. It would be really nice if someone could explain why they have so many properties uptown, and what it means for the tax rolls in a time when NYC could use all the revenue it can get. Nice piece here, thanks.
ReplyDeleteThe building have been donated to one of the myriad businesses that actually own the Corporation of Scientology.
ReplyDeleteThe scam leaders are not interested in expansion, or the general or it's members wellfare. They just want to secure as much as real estate as possible before the whole scam falls apart.
Scientology is a scam run by a destructive cult. If you gullible enough to actually fall for them the first will empty your bank account for the empty promise of superhuman powers and the second will... Well I honestly honestly honestly cannot understand why the authorities do not intervene. The amount of thoroughly documented cases of child labor, slave labor, forced abortions and abusive re-education camps (and I mean the totalitarian communinist version of them) is astounding.
Google any of this yourself (or just read yesterdays NY times) and find out how ineffective the FBI actually is at stopping these gross human right abuses in your own backyard.
Interesting. 220 is such a nice large footprint I was wondering what was going on with that building. 218 next door is housing "TWO5th Lounge" nightclub which had raggae/dancehall nights on the weekends last I saw. And the other side of course is the library.
ReplyDeleteYeah read the AP article in papers today on the abuses against members of their staff. These guys are really dangerous and just want your money.
ReplyDeleteThey have over extended themselves by buying property. Now that their membership is plummeting they no longer can afford to even fix all the places that they bought.
Hopefully the government wakes up and puts the cult leaders behind bars.
F.Y.I. SCIENTOLOGY STORE FRONT BETWEEN 141 & 142 ST 7TH AVE. (A.C.P.B.)
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