The Real Deal - New York Real Estate News

Confidence among the country’s homebuilders took an unexpected dip in June amid concerns over rising costs and trade issues. The National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index fell two points to 64 for the first drop in 2019, according to Bloomberg. A score above 50 shows that more developers perceive sales as good, rather than bad. Lower mortgage rates have failed to boost confidence in the US housing market, as homes remain too […]

New York City’s residential real estate world last week saw the sale of a Trump Tower condominium owned by the widow of Tamir Sapir and the penthouse at 172 Madison Avenue hit the market asking a whopping $98 million. These are some other attention-grabbing deals made public last week. Source: A TRD analysis of public records filed with the New York City Department of Finance and news sources from June 10 to 14. 1.) The […]

Affordable housing for LGBT seniors heading to Bay Shore With many in the real estate community coming together to celebrate Pride Month in June, excavators draped in rainbow flags recently broke ground on a $30 million affordable housing development in Bay Shore, Newsday reported. The project will have 75 units for lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender (LGBT) seniors, the first of its kind in the nation, according to the outlet. While the development will be […]

A second anonymous buyer snapped up a pad at Vornado Realty Trust’s 220 Central Park South in recent months, as the limestone tower nears completion. The residential condominium, named Villa 6 by the developer, was purchased for $39 million, according to property records filed this month. The buyer is an anonymous entity, 220 CPS VILLA 6 LLC, registered care of the New York law firm Federman Steifman LLP. Representatives for Vornado and Federman Steifman could […]

Landlords who count on the vacancy bonus as part of their business model are going to have to recalibrate. The state killed the tool as part of the sweeping rent regulation package signed into law on Friday. That means landlords can no longer add 20 percent to the rent when there is a change in tenant, although owners can still charge the maximum legal rent when there is a vacancy. Legal experts are poring over […]

The Real Deal South Florida’s summer issue live, and digital subscribers to TRD are getting the first look at what’s inside. Subscribers now have access to stories including: Our cover story on Crescent Heights developer Russell Galbut, whose tenacity is legend. A juicy inside look at the EB-5 fraud case that sank the Palm House. A ranking of the top multifamily developers in South Florida. ArchitectonicaGEO’s Laurinda Spear on being the only woman in the […]

Across Long Island, pending home sales slowed in May, marking the first retreat of the year after four months of gains. Last month, 3,152 homes were contracted for sale in both Nassau and Suffolk counties, a 3.5 percent drop from the 3,264 contracted for sale from the same period in 2018, Long Island Business News reported. In Suffolk, pending home sales declined 5.2 percent as the number of homes contracted for sale numbered 1,779 in […]

Unlike other major industries such as Wall Street, where shareholder pressure, influential boards and intense media scrutiny have forced firms to take succession planning seriously, real estate continues to operate on the Great Man theory: Founders have almost complete control over their companies, and their substantial egos often prevent them from designating an heir apparent. Why bother worrying about who comes after you when you expect to live forever? Many longstanding real estate chiefs and […]

The Kushners now own a piece of Billy Macklowe’s new Greenwich Village condominium project. Through a limited liability company, The Kinderlach Trust bought a roughly $4.4 million apartment at 21 East 12th Street on the corner of University Place, property records filed with the city last week show. Seryl Kushner, wife of developer Charles Kushner and mother of senior presidential advisor Jared Kushner, signed as trustee. The two-bedroom pad spans 1,478 square feet, pricing the […]

An obscure UK process known as “company voluntary arrangement” is the heart of a legal dispute involving a group of U.S. landlords and UK-based Arcadia Group, which last month decided to fold its U.S. operations. Vornado, Brookfield and other landlords filed papers in bankruptcy court on June 4 in opposition to Arcadia’s decision to put subsidiary Arcadia USA, which operates 11 Topshop stores in the U.S., into receivership overseen by an administrator. The filing accuses […]

Munich-based insurance company Allianz has acquired a 49 percent equity interest in 26 floors at 30 Hudson Yards, which boasts Manhattan’s highest outdoor observation deck. The equity was previously owned by AT&T’s WarnerMedia, until Related entered a contract in April to buy and lease back WarnerMedia’s office for $2.2 billion. Cushman & Wakefield brokered the deal. The German insurance behemoth’s Hudson Yards acquisition would make New York City the fifth largest city represented in its […]

MedMen Enterprises opened its first Florida dispensary in West Palm Beach as the cannabis company plans to light up the Sunshine State. Los Angeles-based MedMen is focusing on Florida, opening a 7,550-square-foot medical marijuana dispensary at 539 Clematis Street in downtown West Palm. The company is focusing its growth this year on Florida. Out of the 15 dispensaries it expects to open in 2019, 12 are in Florida, according to CNN. Florida started to allow […]

There were 22 contracts signed in Brooklyn’s luxury market last week for a total of about $69.9 million. The properties included 13 townhouses, seven condominiums and two co-ops, and they went for an average price of about $3.3 million, according to the latest report from Stribling & Associates. The firm classifies luxury properties as all homes priced at $2 million or higher. The market was up from the previous week, when it saw 17 contracts […]

UPDATE: June 17, 2019, 2:00 p.m.: The Moinian Group appears to have changed its mind for its development site near the High Line. The developer filed an application with the city’s Buildings Department to construct a nine-story office property at 220 11th Avenue, near 26th Street. The project in Chelsea will stand 133 feet tall and the site is zoned for about 148,000 square feet of commercial space, according to the application. Moinian did not immediately […]

Manhattan’s luxury market saw 22 contracts signed last week for a total of about $195 million, according to the latest report from Olshan Realty. The contracts signed at $4 million or above were split between 16 condominiums, four townhouses and two co-ops. Sales and dollar volume were both up from the week before, when the market saw 20 contracts signed for about $160 million. This marked the eighth week in a row with 20 or […]

A roughly one-acre vacant lot in Elmhurst has hit the market for $13.8 million. But unlike most vacant lots in the city, this one is a historic African-American burial ground where as many as 300 people—including several former slaves—could be buried. The lot comes with an archaeological restriction that requires the St. Mark African Methodist Episcopal Church to be consulted before further developing the lot. Representatives for 90 Queens Inc., which owns the land, have […]

Goldman Sachs’ stock price has been flagging, and it is looking to Blackstone Group in an effort to give it a boost. The firm is planning a fundraising blitz, combining four units that invest in real estate, private companies and other deals and developing a new unit in an effort to grow steady income-generating business that will appeal to investors, according to the Wall Street Journal. The new division will likely have roughly $140 billion […]

Former New York City detective Greg O’Connell bought his first building in Red Hook back in 1967 for $22,000, when the Brooklyn neighborhood was practically a ghost town. Now, his properties are worth at least $400 million, according to a report by Bloomberg. The 77-year-old former drug cop owns a total of about 1.3 million square feet of buildings and 385,000 square feet of undeveloped land in Brooklyn, mainly in Red Hook. O’Connell bought his […]

One of the main criticisms of the 2020 presidential race could apply to the New York real estate industry as well: A lot of the key players are very old. Just as the quest to evict the 72-year-old Donald Trump from the Oval Office has been dominated by the likes of the 77-year-old Bernie Sanders, the 69-year-old Elizabeth Warren and the 76-year-old Joe Biden, the high-octane world of New York real estate is lorded over […]

Nearly 20 limited liability companies for individual multifamily buildings that are linked to a federal fraud complaint are now bankrupt. The filings late last month in a U.S. bankruptcy court in White Plains also relate to over a dozen foreclosure cases initiated by an affiliate of Maverick Real Estate Partners, which in court filings is seeking information on the identity of the owner behind the low-rise, residential properties, all of which are scattered throughout Brooklyn. […]