Sold, for more than the seller ever dreamed: 25 Broad Street.

Stuart Paer’s request to the Red Bank Planning Board on Monday night went through like lightning.

He was asking for a change of use for the second-floor space in a building he owns at 25 Broad Street. Long utilized as an office, it at one time served as an art gallery owned by Lloyd Garrison, and is now used as an office again. The board granted the request. The whole thing took about five minutes.

And just like that, Paer cleared the last hurdle that will enable him to sell the building, and another one he owns at 19 West Front Street, to a Brooklyn-based buyer for $3.2 milion.

What does it mean for downtown? We’re not sure. But when a seller boasts, before a closing, that he’s getting more for a building than it’s worth, it just might be a sign of an overheating market.

Also in the deal: 19 West Front Street, home of Paw Palace.

Paer, who owns the Red Bank Sleep Shoppe mattress store on Maple Avenue (but not the building that houses it), told redbankgreen that, in essence, Pebean Realty made him an offer he’d be an idiot to refuse.

Here’s what he said when we asked why he’d decided now was the time to sell: “Because they’re willing to give me more than the market values those buildings for.”

He reasons that even if he held onto the properties for another five years, appreciation probably wouldn’t get the value up to what he’s getting in this deal. He figures he can invest the profits in hedge funds and bonds and do quite well, without any of the headaches of being a landlord.

“I’d rather take the money now,” he says.

We tried reaching Pebean, but it’s not listed in phone directories, and the only number we could dig up online went unanswered.

Paer says the buyers told him they needed to make a like-kind purchase for tax purposes after selling another property elsewhere.

Paer bought 25 Broad, which had been the home of his mattress store, for $1.2 million in August, 2003, according to Monmouth County records. He picked up 19 West Front about a year later for $525,000. So he’s getting just under twice what he paid in the package sale.

Chelsea Home, a furniture store, is the street level tenant at 25 Broad. Owner Bill Keimig tells us he’s not worried about the deal. He’s got 17 years left on a 20-year lease with modest annual increases. Paw Palace, a pet accessories store, is the tenant at 19 West Front.

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