It’s a mantra often repeated to the parents of young children. The phrase is especially true if you’re living in a cramped New York City apartment in the dead of winter with restless toddlers. Michael Schoen and Chris de Koos are hoping to capitalize on that.
Their company, Little Big Hospitality, inked a 15-year, 45,000-square-foot lease this summer at CIM Group’s long-vacant office building at 50 Columbia Heights in Brooklyn Heights. The firm plans to use the space to open The Beginning Clubhouse, a private family-oriented club that will offer curated programming and classes for children, childcare, food and beverage options, and fitness and wellness amenities.
Schoen, a Brooklyn dad with a background in commercial real estate, said he got the idea for the business during his family’s temporary relocation to London. There, he joined a small club where parents could drop off young children for classes and playtime while slipping away for a sauna or spa treatment.
“That was kind of when the light bulb went off,” Schoen said. “I’m like, ‘how does this space not exist in New York?’”
The seven-story clubhouse will merge the best of adult-focused clubs like Soho House with the needs of families. Plans call for a rooftop pizza oven and garden, a screening room and bowling alley. U.K. design firm Tigerplay is designing a custom indoor jungle gym. There will also be a restaurant and bar.
“We want this to be a place where you can come for date night, or meet friends, just as much as you can bring the whole family,” Schoen said.
The choice of 50 Columbia Heights is as much about real estate as it is about lifestyle. The 1920s brick and timber structure once belonged to the Jehovah’s Witnesses as part of their vast Brooklyn Heights campus. CIM Group acquired it in 2016 along with the rest of the five-building complex. Built into the side of a hill, the property is connected to Furman Street by a dramatic steel staircase that leads to a garden. But CIM never found a tenant.
The lease marks a turning point. Brooklyn’s office market has lagged Manhattan’s recovery, and much of the Panorama development was caught up in the pandemic’s work-from-home fallout.
“This revitalizes it with a use that feels like a home run, given the density in the area and how families already use Brooklyn Bridge Park as their backyard,” said Dan Marks, CEO of Brooklyn brokerage TerraCRG.
The concept appears to be striking a chord. The Beginning has already drawn more than 1,500 membership applications, surpassing the expected cap of 1,200 families. Schoen envisions the Columbia Heights building as the flagship, but says interest is already coming from other cities like Chicago and Nashville.
But for now, he’s focused on Brooklyn.
“Brooklyn is home, and this is where it begins,” he said.
What we’re thinking about: New York City’s hotel market is on fire, according to several brokers I’ve spoken with and a recent Wall Street Journal article. So why do many owners seem to be struggling? Send a note to elizabeth.cryan@therealdeal.com with your thoughts.
A thing we’ve learned: There will soon be more private money spent on the construction of data centers than office buildings. While office construction spending has declined significantly since 2019, data center spending has surged, reaching an annual rate of nearly $40 billion in mid-2025, compared with $44.17 billion on office space, according U.S. Census Bureau data. Not surprisingly, the rise is largely driven by AI and cloud computing.
Elsewhere in New York…
– Gov. Kathy Hochul declared this the safest summer for New York’s subways in 15 years, according to the New York Times. There were 480 major crimes – which include robbery, burglary, grand larceny, assault, murder and rape – recorded in the subway from June to August, a 9 percent drop compared with the same period last year and the fewest since at least 2009, the governor’s office told the Times. Felony assault fell to 31 incidents in August from 52 the same month last year.
— The killings of a couple in their 70s shocked their Queens neighborhood after a fire set by their killer consumed their home of more than 40 years. Prosecutors said Friday they had tracked down Jamel McGriff, the man accused of killing Frank and Maureen Olton, after he used the victims’ credit card to pay for items that he bought with his own Macy’s loyalty card number, NBC 4 reported.
Closing Time
Residential: The top residential deal recorded Friday was $15 million for 330 Spring Street, 12A. The Hudson Square condo unit at The Urban Glass House is 4,300 square feet. The last on-market sale of the unit was in 2007, when it sold for $11.2 million.
Commercial: The top commercial deal recorded was $7.3 million for 208 Centre Street. The mixed-use rental building in Little Italy is five stories and 12,000 square feet.
New to the Market: The highest price for a residential property hitting the market was $29 million for 18 East 71st Street. The Lenox Hill townhome has seven floors and is 13,000 square feet. The Corcoran Group’s Adam Schneider has the listing.
Breaking Ground: The largest new building permit filed was for a proposed 32,507-square-foot, three-story, mixed-use building at 1677 Ocean Parkway in Brooklyn. Architect Richard Bienenfeld is the applicant of record.
— Joseph Jungermann
Read more
CIM secures private family club at 50 Columbia Heights
Soho House goes private in $2.7B deal
Private club, arcade among NYC’s top retail leases last month, with social spaces on the rise
