Episcopal Church finds potential buyer for NYC headquarters

By Leonardo Blair, Senior Reporter Tuesday, October 20, 2026

Four months after announcing plans to offload the 12-story building that houses its headquarters in midtown Manhattan, Episcopal Church leaders say they have found a potential buyer for the building, which is valued at nearly $52 million.

The church’s Executive Council authorized officers to negotiate a purchase agreement to sell the Episcopal Church Center at 815 Second Ave. during a regular meeting Monday, the denomination said in a statement. The council also passed a resolution adopting the Episcopal Church’s strategic plan, which includes the sale of the building.

The sale price and the buyer’s identity are expected to remain confidential until closing. Church staff is expected to keep working only from the building’s sixth floor until after July 2027, when the denomination plans to move to temporary office space in New York City.

“I think it’s really the opportunity to put our money where our mouth is, and say we’re going to repurpose an asset that we have that has been given to us as a legacy, and we’re going to use it to plant seeds for the future,” Presiding Bishop Sean Rowe told the Episcopal News Service after the Executive Council voted on the resolutions Monday.

“This is essentially saying we’re going to sell the house in order to plant new churches and revitalize our congregations, and I think it sends a great message to the church.”

The Executive Council said 25% of the net proceeds from the sale will go into a trust fund to pay for building out and moving into temporary office space in New York. The rest will go into a second trust fund to support grants for church planting, revitalization and redevelopment.

“Investing in congregational vitality is critical to the future of our mission and ministry, and I am selling the actual house to do it,” Rowe said.

The Episcopal Church’s chief financial officer, Chris Lacovara, said in a statement in June that the building is underutilized and that a ground lease to a third-party developer would fulfill church leaders’ decades-old desire to move out of the 63-year-old building.

“We’ve done a detailed analysis about the best use of the building, with consultants and architects,” Lacovara said. “We occupy a fraction of the Church Center space now, and the conclusion is that we don’t need to own and occupy a building in midtown Manhattan.”

Lacovara said the 146,000-square-foot Church Center was completed in 1963 for $4 million. Formally dedicated April 29 that year, the building provided office space for 500 staff members and all official church bodies and cooperating agencies.

With many Church Center employees now living and working in multiple locations across the U.S. and Europe, the denomination occupies less than half the building.

“Dioceses and congregations throughout The Episcopal Church are looking at real estate as a missional asset, and we need to think about the Church Center in the same way,” Lacovara said. “We’re hoping that the decision to market the building, and the process we went through leading up to it, will encourage others to think carefully about how best to steward underutilized buildings and land.”