NEW YORK CITY-Two Manhattan non-profits have inked long-term leases for space in deals facilitated by Cassidy Turley’s Not-for-Profit practice group. Credit Where Credit is Due, which provides financial education and credit union services to low-income New Yorkers, will move to 7,500 square feet in a new building at 530 W. 166^th St. Meanwhile, the Urban Homesteading Assistance Board will stay put at 120 Wall St., where the group renewed its lease early, expanding into 12,600 square feet of space.

“They create affordable co-ops,” says David Lebenstein, senior managing director and leader of the Not-for-Profit Group of UHAB's operations. “They try to set it up in a way where the tenants buy their units rather than rent them.” The pair counseled UHAB to renew early to take advantage of the market, before prices rose too far.

Lebenstein represented the tenants along with Robair Reichenstein, managing director of the practice group. The duo tells GlobeSt.com that non-profit leases tend to entail unique challenges, such as clearing multiple hurdles on the way to the approval process on both the landlord and tenant side.

“If their use is something a little non-traditional--if they’re working with the homeless or with the mentally ill or with HIV--then clearly you have issues with a landlord who may not be receptive,” Lebenstein says. Landlords, he says, might also make the mistake of assuming that “non-profit” means the group will have trouble meeting financial obligations such as rent.

“The balance sheet side often looks weak and the income side looks unsustainable,” Reichenstein says. “And it’s not the case. There are different funding sources.”

For CWCD, space was found in a new building in Washington Heights. The group will use the ground floor space for the credit union. It will look like a traditional bank. The administrative and educational offices will be on the entirety of the fourth floor.

Asking rents were $50 per square foot for the ground floor retail space and $40 per square foot for the fourth floor, Lebenstein and Reichenstein say. For UHAB at 120 Wall St., asking rents were in “the mid 30s,” Lebenstein says. The landlord, Silverstein Properties, fixed an ailing air conditioning system and provided other incentives for the group to stay.