The Real Deal - New York Real Estate News

Vornado-controlled REIT refis Rego Park mall with $253M loan

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 03:00 PM PST

Alexander’s, the department store chain-turned-REIT controlled by Vornado Realty Trust, secured a $253 million loan from Bank of China to refinance part of its giant Queens shopping center. The new loan covers half of the Rego Center shopping complex and replaces a previous Bank of China loan for the same amount, according to property records filed with the city on Friday. The interest-only mortgage has an interest rate of LIBOR plus 1.35 percent, 0.5 percentage […]

Sears to close 80 more stores, full liquidation possible as deadline looms

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 02:30 PM PST

Sears Holdings plans to close 80 more stores nationwide in March as it teeters on the brink of full liquidation. News of the latest closures comes on the last day for parties to make a bid on the 125-year-old retailer in bankruptcy before liquidators break up the company altogether, according to CNBC. The latest round will affect seven Sears or Kmart stores in Florida, five in California, five in New York, two in Illinois and […]

Money for nothing: Landlords are accused of overcharging tenants for poor renovation work, but is state law to blame?

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 02:00 PM PST

When Clem Chan and his husband Matthew Haensly signed the lease for their Sunnyside apartment, they thought the landlord was giving them a deal. They agreed to pay $2,500 a month — a discount from the $2,800 the landlord could legally charge. But after reading news stories about the abuses associated with rent-stabilized apartments, Chan decided to look into the apartment’s rental history. For more than two decades, the rent inched up gradually from $800, […]

Wells Fargo to pay $575M settlement over scandal involving mortgage division

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 01:45 PM PST

Wells Fargo agreed to pay $575 million to all 50 states and the District of Columbia over misconduct that harmed customers, the latest in a string of payouts for the country’s third-largest bank. The payments are meant to cover improper charges to auto loan and mortgage customers, along with the fake accounts scandal that rocked the bank two years ago, according to the Wall Street Journal. States have alleged that Wells Fargo improperly charged residential […]

These were the 10 priciest Queens condo filings of 2018

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 01:15 PM PST

While Brooklyn has gotten a lot of attention for its residential building boom, Queens is seeing a wave of its own. This year, the borough’s top 10 condo priciest filings accepted by the New York State Attorney General’s office in 2018 totaled $1.6 billion. And a huge chunk of that total is thanks to the No. 1 project on the list: Skyline Tower in Long Island City. It’s set to be Queens’ first condo project […]

Rockport provides $110M in financing for East Harlem complex converted to Section 8

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 12:45 PM PST

Charlie Gendron’s LIHC Investment Group secured a $110 million mortgage from Rockport Mortgage to refinance East Harlem’s Lakeview Apartments, a low-income housing complex that recently exited the Mitchell Lama-program but will remain affordable under Section 8 guidelines. The financing, according to a public filing recorded Friday with New York City’s Department of Finance, includes about $108.4 million to refinance existing debt, and about $1.6 million for a building loan. Commercial Observer first reported the financing […]

Red Apple’s John Catsimatidis, Slate’s David Schwartz join Future City 2019

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 12:15 PM PST

Red Apple Group’s John Catsimatidis and Slate’s David Schwartz are the latest additions to The Real Deal‘s Future City 2019 in the Bahamas. The developers will be joining Michael Stern, Don Peebles, Ken Fisher, Louise Sunshine, Bruce Mosler, Bess Freedman and many more industry titans at Future City, Jan. 27-29, 2019 at the brand-new Baha Mar resort. Future City is an exclusive two-day opportunity for a group of 200 C-level executives in the fields of […]

Fed tax overhaul drove more homebuyers to low-tax states like Florida in 2018

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 11:45 AM PST

A lot happened in 2018, but sticking to residential real estate, more people moved to Florida as a direct consequence of the federal tax plan. President Trump signed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 at the end of the year, and after 12 months, there are clear winners and losers. The winners are states with low taxes and the losers are those with the opposite, according to Mansion Global. Florida, where there’s no […]

Affordable developer Foxy Management lands $72M in financing for Bronx project

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 11:00 AM PST

Foxy Management has closed on roughly $72.15 million in financing from the state and city for a senior housing building it has planned for the Bronx. The money is for Foxy Management’s planned 177-unit building at 612 East 179th Street in Tremont, known as Arthur Avenue Apartments. The package includes about $58.5 million from the New York State Housing Finance Agency and $13.78 million from the city’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development. The building […]

Downhill deals: U.S. ski towns saw dip in sales this year

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 11:00 AM PST

Even home sales in ski towns are on a downward slope. Ski areas across the country have seen a 2.1 percent decrease in real estate transactions compared to last year, Mansion Global reported. According to data from Realtor.com on 35 different U.S. towns, transactions from January to September 2018 in some of the most popular ski areas, like Aspen, have fallen year-over-year by as much as 27.6 percent. Amy Doherty, a Douglas Elliman broker based […]

Lendlease, L+M bringing 175-unit mixed-use project to seminary site

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 10:15 AM PST

Morningside Heights — already home to Columbia University’s growing campus — is getting another large mixed-use building. Construction giant Lendlease filed plans for its 42-story mixed-use project at the Union Theological Seminary’s 100 Claremont Avenue with the Department of Buildings on Friday. It will span about 350,000 square feet overall, including about 250,000 square feet of residential space and 25,000 square feet of community space. The project will house 175 residential units. Lendlease and its partner L+M purchased air rights […]

Send the date: Share your real estate events with The Real Deal!

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 09:30 AM PST

Each week, The Real Deal provides a roundup of the top real estate events in New York you need to know for the week ahead. Send conferences, panel events, networking opportunities and more to events@TheRealDeal.com. To search for future industry events or browse past ones, click here.

More brokerages are promoting secret listings — and REBNY isn’t happy

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 08:45 AM PST

The year was 2016. The billionaire was Len Blavatnik. And the house was the Wildenstein mansion, a 20,000-square-foot property at 19 East 64th Street. After a handshake deal, Blavatnik thought the house was his — until heirs to the art gallery fortune accepted an offer for $79.5 million from HNA Group. Blavatnik sued and lost. But the story doesn’t end there. With the Chinese conglomerate under pressure to sell off its assets, the billionaire pounced, paying […]

Breaking down virtual brokerage eXp’s revamped stock options program

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 08:00 AM PST

EXp Realty agents will now get a set dollar amount worth of shares, instead of a fixed number of shares, through the company’s stock options program. The shares are given when agents reach specific milestones, Inman reported. The virtual real estate brokerage first started offering stock options to agents in 2014. Under the new plan, when agents complete their first transaction, they will receive $200 worth of eXp World Holdings common stock. When they hit […]

Home prices in the world’s most expensive market are tumbling

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 07:15 AM PST

Hong Kong’s property market reached unfathomable heights in 2017, but prices started falling back to earth in 2018. Goldman Sachs projects a 15 to 20 percent decline in property prices over two years as interest rates, Bloomberg reported. Home prices have dropped 7 percent from a high in August. One site in Kai Tak, for example, had a winning bid from China Overseas Land & Investment of HK$13,523, or $1,726, per square foot of floor […]

Sovereign Health looks to bring new medical center to Flushing

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 06:30 AM PST

Sovereign Health System plans to construct an ambulatory care and medical office building at 135-25 Northern Boulevard, according to a pre-filing with the city’s Department of Buildings. The owner bought the property for $19 million in 2017, according to property records. Plans call for an 89,000-square-foot facility with 7,000 square feet of commercial space. It will include a parking garage containing 187 spaces. The center will stand 12 stories high, according to plans. Henry Meltzer, […]

California cannabis retail stuck in the weeds

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 05:50 AM PST

It turns out not all Californians are high on the idea of cannabis shops opening in their neighborhood. After voters approved Proposition 64, proponents projected thousands of storefronts and farms would be licensed, and that cannabis would eventually rival California’s $7-billion wine industry. But the Los Angeles Times reported that first year sales show the market hasn’t performed as well as retailers had hoped. Prop 64 legalized recreational use of pot for adults, and established […]

Here are the top broker comings and goings of 2018

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 05:00 AM PST

Like the “force majeure” clauses written into real estate deals, there were powers well beyond the control of mortal real estate brokers that led to so many job changes in 2018. The hasty and unforeseen closures this year of Town Residential and Eastern Consolidated could have seemed like acts of God to hundreds of rank-and-file brokers who suddenly found themselves – along with their colleagues – looking for somewhere to land this year. For several […]

National Cheat Sheet: Fed’s interest rate hike raises Trump Org’s borrowing costs, US housing market slowdown could continue … & more

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 04:30 AM PST

Trump Org faces extra $1M in borrowing costs from higher interest rates The Federal Reserve irked President Donald Trump by raising interest rates for the fourth time in 2018 — and the increase could saddle the Trump Organization with an extra $1 million in borrowing costs, Bloomberg reported. An analysis by the outlet found that the company’s cumulative costs from interest rate hikes has been $6 million since Trump entered the White House in January 2017. […]

This month in real estate history

Posted: 28 Dec 2018 04:00 AM PST

1887: Health department clamps down on speculative tenement market The New York City Health Department spearheaded a crackdown on speculative real estate investors 131 years ago this month. Health commissioner James Bayles launched the initiative by asking the city’s mayor, Abram Hewitt, to let his department file lis pendens against building owners who violated tenement construction rules, the New York Times reported. The measure, Bayles maintained, would alert future buyers of a building’s violations before the […]