Tel Aviv-Yafo Municipality is selling the apartment of the late Mania Bialik, wife of national poet Hayim Nahman Bialik. The apartment is up for sale at a minimum price of NIS 12.5 million plus VAT (NIS 14.75 million). Such an amount reflects the most expensive price per square meter being asked for by sellers anywhere in the city.
The apartment is at 3 Melchett Street in the heart of the city, between Rothschild Boulevard and Allenby Street. It is a 145 square meter, four-room apartment, with a 30 square meter balcony and an eight square meter balcony, a storage room and parking in the building. The municipality, according to the auction brochure, has lease rights for the apartment for 999 years.
The threshold conditions included in the auction brochure say, “The financial offer of the auction participant will not be less than NIS 12,500,000, plus VAT as applicable. A bid that is lower than this amount will be rejected.”
The minimum price is at least NIS 76,220 per square meter, similar to prices in the newest and most prestigious construction projects in the Sde Dov district, which is currently being built in the north of the city.
“We can certainly assume that there will be great interest in this auction,” a real estate source tells “Globes,” “but the minimum price that has been set is far above the real price of the apartment. With optimal planning, it could perhaps ‘scrape’ this value from below, but in its current state, these are not its price levels in my opinion.”
The auction was published by the municipality in recent days, and will remain open for bids until September 14.
“All the elements in the building have been restored to their originals”
The building in Melchett Street was built in the 1930s and is considered a Bauhaus classic and such is subject to a preservation order by the municipality. Rothstein Real Estate unit City People Urban Renewal renovated the building as part of a TAMA 38/1 urban renewal and earthquake strengthening project. The original building had six apartments on three floors with three more floors added with one apartment on each floor. A 273 square meter duplex on one of the new upper floors with a 127 square meter balcony was sold several years ago for NIS 25 million, reflecting NIS 74,300 per square meter. Slightly lower than the price now being asked by the municipality for the Bialik apartment.
City People Urban Renewal CEO and owner Ron Chen says, “This was a complicated project with very high construction costs, even by today’s terms, of around NIS 20,000 per square meter. Construction was completed 3-4 years ago, during which we raised the building in order to build a robotic parking lot. We carried out meticulous conservation work, in which all the elements of the building were restored to their original level. For example, the railing on the balcony in the famous photo of the late Mania Bialik was also restored to the same model and type.
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“This is a project in an excellent location, in the heart of Tel Aviv, where all the apartments are large apartments, 100 square meters or more in size. It took us a very long time to implement it, because of its complexity, and during this time, we can assume that the apartment in question was greatly improved.”
The municipality had already sought to sell in 2009
The late Mania Bialik ordered before her death that her apartment be bequeathed for public use. For years, it housed a library and then a museum – the Theater Collection named after the late Yehuda Gabbay. A few years ago, the museum was vacated, and in 2009 it was announced that the municipality wanted to sell the apartment.
The request to sell the apartment itself was the focus of some controversy, as the late Mania Bialik had supposedly designated the apartment for public use only. In the past, the municipality addressed this and stated that there was no obstacle to selling the apartment. It should be noted that after the museum vacated the apartment, the municipality established the Woman’s House named after Mania Bialik, which is located behind the Beit Bialik complex, at 22 Bialik Street in Tel Aviv.
Published by Globes, Israel business news – en.globes.co.il – on July 15, 2025.
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