Japan Firm to Buy Mobil’s N.Y. Building

Mobil Corp., which announced earlier this year it was moving its headquarters out of New York, said today it had agreed to sell its mid-town Manhattan headquarters to a Japanese company for a reported $250 million.

Mobil has occupied the 1.5-million-square-foot building, located at 42nd Street and Lexington Avenue, since 1954, but said in April it would move its main offices to Fairfax, Va., to lower its expenses.

Mobil, the second-largest U.S. oil company, said today it will sell the building to Hiro Real Estate Co., a major private investor from Japan.

Mobil didn’t disclose the value of the transaction, but the Wall Street Journal said today it was about $250 million.