Shortly after the Hearst Magazine Building's completion, Urban and Post drew up plans for a new 1,000-seat concert hall to be built at street level, with a 600-seat secondary auditorium in the basement, to be completed by 1929. The Hearst Corporation acquired the land under the building in 1930 for $2.25 million or $2.5 million. However, with the onset of the Great Depression shortly after the Hearst Magazine Building's completion, planning for its upper stories stalled for over a decade. The New York Evening Journal Inc., one of Hearst's newspapers, transferred ownership of the building to Hearst Magazines Inc. in 1937, at which point the building was valued as being worth $3.253 million. This was part of a reorganization of properties owned by the Hearst Corporation. By that point, Hearst owed $126 million (equivalent to $ billion in ) and was in the process of selling off his holdings. Hearst considered issuing $35.5 million debt, in part to repurchase the Hearst Magazine Building, but ultimately withdrew his proposal.