The Real Deal - New York Real Estate News

First came the condo market slowdown. Then came the pandemic. And now, Aby Rosen’s luxury development at 100 East 53rd Street is in crisis because of an improper “backdoor deal.” The partner, China Vanke, “orchestrated an irreconcilable and grossly improper conflict of interest” that put it “on both sides of the borrower-lender relationship without RFR’s consent,” Rosen’s firm alleges in a lawsuit filed last Friday in New York County Supreme Court, Crain’s reported. Vanke now

The music could stop at Guitar Center in the near future. The retailer is preparing for bankruptcy after missing a $45 million interest payment on its debt, the New York Times reported. The company has reached out to creditors to explore a plan where it could emerge from bankruptcy in 2021. The possibility of bankruptcy comes after Moody’s and S&P downgraded Guitar Center’s rating this spring over concerns about its leverage. A spokesperson for Guitar

In excess-loving South Florida, there’s always room for more — more mansions on the waterfront, more luxury penthouses, and more Trump. TRD‘s latest episode of Coffee Talk includes just one Trump. Not Donald, not Eric or Don Jr., but one whose name South Florida industry experts know just as well — South African-born developer Jules Trump. Though he bears no relation to the White House occupants, Trump is the leader of the similarly named Trump

Sam Chang, one of the developers with the largest exposure to Manhattan’s struggling hospitality industry, sold a newly completed hotel in Chelsea for $147 million. Chang’s McSam Hotel Group sold the 531-key property at 140 West 28th Street, property records filed with the city Monday show. The identity of the buyer was not clear. The signatory on the documents is attorney Gregory Weingart from the Pittsburgh office of the law firm Eckert Seamans, whose website

A new investigation into buildings that benefit from the 421a tax abatement by New York Attorney General Letitia James found that four developers in Brooklyn and Queens received the tax break but didn’t live up to the program’s requirements. The developers’ misdeeds ranged from falsely reporting a full building was vacant to not offering rent-stabilized leases to tenants as the program requires in most cases. “Rent-stabilization laws exist to protect tenants, and we will not

The new owner of Keller Williams New York City is bringing in a new leader. Richard Amato, who bought the franchise from Ilan Bracha and Haim Binstock earlier this year, has tapped Lauren Balbuena to replace CEO Mark Chin, the company said. Balbuena previously led Keller Williams Points North on Long Island, another franchise owned by Amato. Chin, who ran the Manhattan franchise during a tumultuous few months, culminating with its sale in February, will

This year’s spring housing market came a couple of months later than usual to the leafy suburbs of New Jersey. But it was worth the wait. Michele Kolsky-Assatly, a veteran agent with Coldwell Banker focused on Bergen County’s luxury market, has been busier than ever with the exodus of families from New York City. “They never want to be locked up in a high-rise again,” Kolsky-Assatly said. “Die-hard New Yorkers, hedge fund Wall Street businessmen

The number of contracts inked last week in Brooklyn’s luxury market surged to levels not seen since before the pandemic began. In all, 27 homes that went into contract for a total volume of $89 million, according to Compass’ weekly report on contracts signed for $2 million or more. That’s a significant increase from the prior week, when 11 deals were inked. The median asking price was $2.88 million with an average discount of 2

The most expensive Manhattan property to go into contract last week says a lot about the contradictory realities of New York’s luxury market right now. Though buyers are returning, sellers and sponsors are still not out of the woods. A townhouse at 14 East 11th Street — which notched the week’s priciest contract — was listed for $28.5 million in July and ended in a bidding war between three buyers, according to listing broker Jeremy

The Gowanus rezoning still has some big hurdles to clear when it comes to securing community support — namely whether some of the neighborhood’s poorest will benefit. Supporters of the proposal, meanwhile, see this as a chance to give new residents a shot at living in a community that is already wealthier than the average Brooklyn neighborhood. Questions put to the city by the public and local community board during a virtual meeting last week

Americans paid more for newly-built homes last month but they didn’t buy as many of them. The median price of new homes that sold in September was $326,800, up 4.5 percent from August, according to the Census Bureau’s monthly report of signed contracts and paid deposits for newly-built single family homes. The data comes as the number of new homes sold last month — seasonally adjusted — fell 3.5 percent, to 959,000, from over 1

As more malls and shopping centers close or see their anchor tenants fall into bankruptcy, they may be repurposed for a new use: senior housing. George and Pat Ritzinger are among the early beneficiaries of the trend: The couple moved to Folkestone, a retirement community in Wayzata, Minnesota, developed on land that formerly housed a shopping mall built in 1967, according to the New York Times. The mall was demolished and Folkestone opened in 2013.

After a volatile six months for residential real estate, Compass is in growth mode again. The brokerage said it’s expanding to Hawaii, where it has brought on 14 agents in O’ahu, Maui, Kaua’i and the Big Island. Collectively, the agents and their teams sold $350 million worth of real estate last year, Compass said. The push to expand to the Aloha state came from Compass agents, CEO Robert Reffkin said in a statement. In doing

Blackstone Group is buying Simply Self Storage from Brookfield Asset Management for about $1.2 billion, Bloomberg reported. Brookfield bought the storage company in 2016 and has more than doubled its footprint; it now has more than 8 million square feet of space across the U.S. It started seeking buyers for the company earlier this year. With this deal, Blackstone, which owns $300 million worth of self-storage facilities, would become the country’s third-largest owner of storage

Tishman Speyer has formed a $300 million blank-check company — becoming the first major real estate owner to embrace what’s become a wildly popular but speculative investing tool. Through a newly formed SPAC, or special-purpose acquisition company, the landlord is looking to merge with a proptech company, according to a regulatory filing Friday. TS Innovation Acquisitions Corp. will be valued at $375 million following its IPO, the filing said. As one of the country’s largest

Matt Borstein, Deutsche Bank’s global head of commercial real estate, is moving on to become a partner at Oak Hill Advisor. Brestein has spent a decade at the bank and led its $30 billion real estate financing operation for the past five years. He was also named the head of global financing and credit trading for the Americas last year, according to Commercial Observer. In his new role, Borstein will help expand Oak Hill Advisors’

J.C. Penney’s plan to rescue itself from bankruptcy is facing a challenge. A group of the company’s creditors is asking the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Corpus Christi, Texas to slow the sale of J.C. Penney’s real estate to another group of lenders — called the debtor-in-possession, or DIP, lenders — arguing that the pending deal would allow the buyers a 162.4 percent recovery, leaving the other creditors with a recovery of 10.3 percent, according to

Not spooked: Kalanick bets on “ghost kitchens” Uber co-founder Travis Kalanick pioneered ride-sharing. Next up? Kitchen sharing. Companies tied to Kalanick’s CloudKitchens, an L.A. company that rents space to food delivery startups, have shelled out $130 million to buy 40 properties nationwide, reported the Wall Street Journal. “Ghost kitchen” companies rent out non-traditional spaces — CloudKitchens bought shuttered restaurants, auto-body shops and warehouses — to food businesses that don’t want to buy or lease restaurant

Fall is usually a cool-down period for the U.S. housing market. Not this year. Homes sold nearly twice as fast in September as they did in the same month last year, and faster than in any month this year, according to a Zillow report. The pandemic seems to have pushed back the typical home shopping season into the fall and perhaps winter, after supply and demand cratered during the spring. One factor was prospective buyers

After years of sparring over its highest and best use, the fate of 5 World Trade Center was left to a competition. The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and the Lower Manhattan Development Corp. last year announced what was effectively a truce: The agencies would consider both residential and commercial visions for the site. Among them were Silverstein Properties and Brookfield Properties’ residential project and MaryAnne Gilmartin’s office tower. But the world

Of the 2,072 single-family Manhattan residences built before 1920, nearly half have never been renovated. Those homes present some challenges for the folks tasked with selling them — but often surprises as well. Brokers might find herringbone flooring beneath wall-to-wall carpeting, a marble mantle behind a coat of paint or antique mirror doors hidden away. “That’s one of the thrills,” said Cathy Franklin, a broker for Corcoran. Those involved in selling large properties owned by