JERSEY CITY — The Sip Avenue site that is home to the VIP Diner, the Journal Square eatery in business for over 45 years, has been sold.

Real estate firm Holliday Fenoglio Fowler announced the sale of 175 Sip Ave. on Thursday, making public a deal that has been rumored for months. The property is a roughly half-acre lot at Sip Avenue and Kennedy Boulevard, making it prized land for a real estate developer. The Journal Square PATH station and transit hub is a short walk away.

HFF’s press release announcing the sale calls the area around the VIP “rapidly gentrifying.”

It’s not clear what the new owner intends to do with the property or when the diner may close, but the diner’s manager, Michael Pagonas, said a residential building is likely. Zoning would allow for a high-rise on the site, potentially one 25 stories tall.

One of the last classic diners left in Jersey City, the VIP was never known for its cuisine. But it’s in a good location, it’s open 24 hours and it has a parking lot.

“Kaisha,” an episode in the sixth season of “The Sopranos,” was filmed there in 2006.

“Another diner gone,” lamented Councilman Rich Boggiano, who represents the area.

HFF did not say who purchased the site, but a source with knowledge of the sale said it was a company tied to Peter de Neufville, a former congressional candidate in New Jersey’s 11th district and one of Chris Christie’s top fundraisers. A phone call seeking comment from de Neufville was not returned.

Other companies tied to de Neufville own nearby properties: the two-story building at Kennedy Boulevard and Bergen Avenue that includes Boulevard Drinks, which he purchased in 2015, and the three-story Goodwill building a block from the VIP, bought in 2014.

Rumors have spread for years that the VIP was on its way out. In 2010, the diner almost became a Walgreens, with the pharmacy chain applying to the city to tear down the building.

Chris Mench lives nearby on Academy Street. Mench, 25, said he visits the VIP at least monthly for the classics: breakfast food, mozzarella sticks. He said he is not surprised by the sale, considering how large the lot is.

"It's definitely sad,” he said. “I love diner culture. It's a very quintessentially Jersey thing.”

This is Hudson County, so there is a corruption connection in the VIP’s past. In 1990, Vincent Michael Morris, its former owner, was busted on an obstruction of justice charge. Morris admitted he used his court contacts to lower the sentence of a convicted racketeer. He was sentenced to one year in prison.

Morris had previously been arrested for robbing actress Sophia Loren of $700,000 worth of jewelry at gunpoint in 1970.

Terrence T. McDonald may be reached at tmcdonald@jjournal.com. Follow him on Twitter @terrencemcd. Find The Jersey Journal on Facebook.