June 4 (Bloomberg) -- Deutsche Bank AG agreed to sell Worldwide Plaza, a New York skyscraper it seized from investor Harry Macklowe, to a partnership including RCG Longview and George Comfort & Sons, two people familiar with the matter said.

A contract was signed yesterday, according to the people, who asked not to be identified because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly. The terms weren’t disclosed. The 47-story building, at Eighth Avenue and West 49th Street, has 1.6 million square feet.

Macklowe paid $1.74 billion for the property in February 2007, according to Real Capital Analytics Inc. data. It was among seven buildings Macklowe bought for $7 billion from Equity Office Property Trust, primarily using debt. New York City office building prices have dropped 30 percent to 50 percent since the peak in 2007, said Woody Heller, head of the capital transactions group at Studley, a New York-based brokerage.

“If it’s financed and goes through that could be real good news for the New York commercial market,” said Jessica Ruderman, a Real Capital senior market analyst. The transaction may be the biggest office sale of 2009, she said.

RCG managing partner Peter Cohen didn’t return a call for comment. John Gallagher, a Deutsche Bank spokesman, and Robert Deckey, the chief investment officer at George Comfort, declined to comment.

The Wall Street Journal earlier reported the transaction.

Deutsche Bank Foreclosure

Deutsche Bank foreclosed on the Macklowe property in 2008. The debt on the building was part of a $3.1 billion pooled commercial mortgage, according to a 2008 report by Standard & Poor’s. The loans, which covered Worldwide Plaza and three other buildings, contained a $1.6 billion mortgage, plus $1.5 billion of subordinated mezzanine debt.

About 600,000 square feet of the building is being vacated by Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide, the advertising and public relations firm owned by WPP Group Plc, which is moving to a building on 11th Avenue. The vacancy made it harder to sell the building, Ruderman said.

RCG is a real estate venture of Ramius LLC and the Feil Organization, both of New York.

New York-based George Comfort manages 9.6 million square feet of commercial space, with ownership interests in 60 percent of those properties, according to the company’s Web site. The buildings include 2 Wall St.; the Quakerbridge Mall in Hamilton, New Jersey; and Wilshire Beverly Center in Beverly Hills, California.

To contact the reporter on this story: David M. Levitt in New York at dlevitt@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: June 4, 2009 17:48 EDT