The Real Deal - New York Real Estate News

Compass shares lost more than $3B of value in three months of trading

Posted: 07 Jul 2021 02:40 PM PDT

It took Compass just three months as a public company to lose more than $3 billion of market value. The stock closed at $12.25 on Wednesday, a new low that gave the company a market value of $4.7 billion. That’s a drop of 39 percent from its starting price of $20.15 at its April 1 debut on the New York Stock Exchange. At that price, the company was worth about $7.8 billion. Investors who bought

Freo Group shops Clinton Hill multifamily for $35M

Posted: 07 Jul 2021 02:20 PM PDT

Investor Freo Group is looking for a big return on a 40-unit apartment building in Clinton Hill that it bought just before the pandemic. The firm is eyeing $35 million for the six-story Knitting Factory Lofts at 79 Clifton Place, sources told The Real Deal. A sale at that price would pencil out to around $600 a foot for the 58,000-square-foot building. The company paid $22.9 million for the property in January 2020. Hodges Ward

Real estate’s winners and losers in the City Council primaries

Posted: 07 Jul 2021 01:00 PM PDT

New tallies show that most of the City Council candidates most feared by the real estate industry likely won’t be taking office. The release Tuesday night of ranked-choice voting selections, including absentee ballots, in the 35 Council primaries reveals key victories for the industry and only a handful by socialists. Results won’t be certified until later this month. The New York chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America endorsed six candidates for City Council, but

City replaces Trump as Central Park rink operator — with Trump pals

Posted: 07 Jul 2021 12:25 PM PDT

For corporations and governments intertwined with Donald Trump, cutting ties after the Capital Insurrection has played out a bit like Whac-a-Mole — terminate one connection to the former president and another pops up. Cushman & Wakefield, for example, told the Washington Post in January it would no longer do business with the Trump Organization, though severing these ties is easier said than done. It began by vacating its role as an office leasing agent for

Brooklyn contracts cool as summer heats up

Posted: 07 Jul 2021 10:45 AM PDT

As the summer heat raged, Brooklyn contract signings cooled last week. Twenty-three contracts for homes worth $2 million or more were inked from June 28 to July 5, down from the 30 deals signed the previous week, according to Compass’s weekly report. Ten were for condos, nine were for townhouses and four were for co-ops. The asking prices of those contracts totaled $72.8 million, down from the $96 million total of the previous week. The

Spec home developer Todd Glaser, partners buy entire Tarpon Island in Palm Beach for $85M

Posted: 07 Jul 2021 10:00 AM PDT

Developer Todd Michael Glaser and his partners closed on an $85 million purchase of a small island in Palm Beach. Glaser and an investment group that includes Jonathan Fryd and Scott Robins acquired the 2.3-acre Tarpon Island, according to Glaser. It’s between Everglades Island and the Palm Beach barrier island, on the Lake Worth Lagoon. The luxury spec home developer is planning to expand and renovate the five-bedroom, 12,321-square-foot estate on the island. It will

Native Americans investing in real estate find profit, purpose

Posted: 07 Jul 2021 09:30 AM PDT

Native American tribes across the country are expanding their real estate holdings, moving past casinos in search of stable returns and opportunities to rebuild their communities. Citing a unique political opportunity and new channels of capital, tribal leaders have recently invested in more commercial and mixed-use buildings that offer profit potential and social benefits for other members, the New York Times reported. For some tribes, owning real estate carries symbolic importance, representing reasserted control over

Days before condo fell, urgent requests faced bureaucratic replies

Posted: 07 Jul 2021 08:49 AM PDT

In the days leading up to the Champlain Towers South collapse, the condo association and its engineer sent a series of increasingly urgent emails to Surfside town officials. The messages sought approvals for a variety of small requests that would have allowed for extensive repair work on the building to finally begin. Starting on May 12 and ending June 21 — three days before the 12-story complex fell — the advisories repeated that the condo

These hotel markets have entered a depression

Posted: 07 Jul 2021 08:07 AM PDT

Some U.S. hotel markets are in such bad shape that a recession would look good. Though leisure travel is picking up, New York City’s lodging market has entered an economic depression, according to a report from the American Hotel & Lodging Association. Revenue per available room, the industry’s standard measuring stick, was $95 in May, down 62 percent from $249 in May 2019. “While some industries are starting to rebound as Covid-19 restrictions ease across

Real estate gets its mayor: Eric Adams

Posted: 07 Jul 2021 07:47 AM PDT

The real estate industry’s bet on Eric Adams has paid off. The Brooklyn borough president clinched the Democratic primary for mayor late Tuesday when a count of absentee ballots pushed him above 50 percent of the vote, including spillover votes from rivals in New York’s new ranked-choice voting system. Adams was heavily supported by business interests, and real estate in particular. However, that was not the primary reason he won, nor does it mean he

Authentic Brands files for IPO amid acquisition spree

Posted: 07 Jul 2021 06:35 AM PDT

As malls struggle to recover from their pandemic blues, one of their biggest tenants is looking to strike gold on Wall Street. Authentic Brands, the owner of retail mainstays such as Forever 21 and Brooks Brothers, filed for an IPO on Tuesday, according to Bloomberg News. The company gave a temporary listing size of $100 million, though Bloomberg estimates it could be worth roughly $10 billion. Authentic had a frenzied 2020, collaborating with retail giant

Senators propose stricter building inspections following Surfside collapse

Posted: 07 Jul 2021 06:00 AM PDT

Three New York state senators are pushing for stiffer building inspection requirements following the deadly collapse of a condo building in Surfside, Florida, two weeks ago. Legislators from Nassau County, Brooklyn and Staten Island on Tuesday proposed a law requiring building owners to pay for periodic inspections of their properties, according to Patch. “How much do we know about the structural integrity of our buildings here?” asked Sen. Todd Kaminsky at a news conference announcing

“The Cult of We” review: “Emperor’s New Clothes” of the Silicon Valley age

Posted: 07 Jul 2021 05:30 AM PDT

Jamie Dimon, billionaire banker, adviser to presidents, leonine master of the financial universe, had FOMO. Mohammed bin Salman, the brash upstart who had come out on top in a ruthless Game of Thobes at the House of Saud, was eager to announce his primacy on the world stage. Masayoshi Son, whose early bet on Alibaba had made him one of the world’s wealthiest investors and a startup kingmaker, still had a Rodney Dangerfield-esque “I don’t

Office vacancy rate in New Jersey nears 19%

Posted: 07 Jul 2021 05:00 AM PDT

New Jersey’s office vacancy rate hit a 15-year high in the second quarter. The 18.8 percent figure includes 9.1 million square feet of empty space available for subleasing, according to Avison Young’s quarterly market report. The share of vacant sublease space in the total vacancy was 16.5 percent, the highest since 2005. But it could get worse. “This ratio is expected to increase as companies continue to assess their long-term real estate needs,” the report

Beleaguered taxi kingpin gets $21.7M cash infusion

Posted: 07 Jul 2021 04:00 AM PDT

Tired: taxicab empires. Wired: charter school networks. One-time taxi mogul Victor Weingarten, who converted a stockpile of yellow cab medallions into real estate holdings, recently sold a development parcel in the Bronx for a cool $21.7 million. The buyer, KIPP NYC, is one of several expanding charter school networks that have increasingly emerged as a lifeline for commercial landlords, to say nothing of yesterday’s medallion kingpins. Elsewhere, a developer assembled parcels for a new condo

Warburg Pincus bigwig, Hamptons socialite sell $15M Walker Tower pad at loss

Posted: 06 Jul 2021 03:28 PM PDT

To a real estate investor, the combining of two units at Walker Tower might look like energy wasted. The lavish spread at the Chelsea building cost upwards of $17 million to assemble but was sold for $15.3 million last month, property records show. The seller was David Krieger, a senior adviser at private equity firm Warburg Pincus’ energy group who is married to Devorah Rose, a socialite and editor of Hamptons-based magazine Social Life. Krieger

Tishman Speyer’s Shanghai bonanza: ByteDance buys four buildings

Posted: 06 Jul 2021 02:30 PM PDT

Tishman Speyer has scored a major deal in Shanghai, selling 2.1 million square feet of office and retail space to ByteDance. Since 2011, the New York-based real estate developer and landlord has been building the Springs, a massive, mixed-use complex on 66 acres in China’s most populous city. ByteDance, which is known for its popular video sharing app TikTok, recently signed a deal to buy four buildings — ranging from four to 29 stories —

Mystery buyer drops $16M on historic UES brownstone

Posted: 06 Jul 2021 02:04 PM PDT

Andrew Rifkin of DLJ Real Estate Capital Partners has sold his Upper East Side brownstone for $16 million dollars, public records show. The buyer, whose identity remains a mystery, was represented by Matthew Saenger of Green Square Capital Advisors. The 5,700-square-foot townhouse at 11 East 93rd Street sits in the Carnegie Hill Historic District, an enclave of landmarked buildings along the eastern border of Central Park. Built by architect A.B. Ogden in 1901, it’s one

CalSTRS deal values 1177 Sixth Ave at $860M

Posted: 06 Jul 2021 01:37 PM PDT

The part-owner of a 1-million-square-foot Midtown skyscraper has sold its stake at a price that may calm investors anxious over the pandemic’s impact on office prices. UBS Realty Investors sold its roughly 50-percent stake in 1177 Sixth Avenue in a deal that values the 47-story tower at $860 million, sources told The Real Deal. The valuation represents a capitalization rate of roughly 4.5 percent, one source said, which is about where pricing for similar properties

Flatiron Building owners pursue sale, citing discord over renovation

Posted: 06 Jul 2021 12:57 PM PDT

Four owners are trying to 23 skidoo from their stakes in the Flatiron Building, apparently catching the fifth owner by surprise. GFP Real Estate, the Sorgente Group and ABS Partners, which collectively own a 75 percent stake in the landmarked building through four different entities, are seeking to offload their share of the property through a partition sale. On Friday, the companies filed a complaint against an LLC tied to the fifth owner, Nathan Royce

Manhattan luxury home market braces for dog days

Posted: 06 Jul 2021 11:32 AM PDT

Summer is officially here and along with it a likely slowdown in the Manhattan luxury home market. Though the number of such contracts inked last week remained a healthy 33, the dollar volume dropped to the lowest total since the final week of January, according to the Olshan Report, which tracks contracts for homes in the borough asking $4 million or more. The asking prices of those homes totaled just over $237 million, barely above

Nextdoor to go public in $686M SPAC deal

Posted: 06 Jul 2021 08:45 AM PDT

Nextdoor is the latest proptech company to try its hand at the SPAC market. The San Francisco-based social networking service for neighborhoods said Tuesday that it plans to go public through a special purpose acquisition company, raising $686 million and valuing the company at $4.3 billion, the New York Times reported. That’s in line with the $4 billion to $5 billion valuation the company was reportedly targeting when it first announced plans to go public

Kushner Cos. expands apartment holdings in MS, TN, VA for $400M

Posted: 06 Jul 2021 07:15 AM PDT

Kushner Companies is going all-in on the Southeast. The real estate firm has acquired or signed contracts to snap up 2,500 apartments in Mississippi, Tennessee and Virginia in the past month. The overall price was about $400 million, according to Laurent Morali, the president of Kushner Cos., the Wall Street Journal reported. The company, which once bit off more than it could chew in Midtown by overpaying for a 1950s office building, turned its attention

Former Goldman Sachs partner lists Upper East Side townhouse for $80M

Posted: 06 Jul 2021 06:20 AM PDT

This Upper East Side townhouse is poised to break a two-year-old record for the most expensive single-family home sale in Manhattan — if it fetches its asking price. A former Goldman Sachs partner listed his 15,000-sq-ft mansion at 973 Fifth Avenue for $80 million, Bloomberg reported. With nine bedrooms spread across seven floors, the 115-year-old home sits at the corner of 79th Street, directly across from Central Park. An entity tied to David Leuschen, a

Here’s an inside look at Extended Stay’s 62K-key portfolio

Posted: 06 Jul 2021 05:45 AM PDT

The following is a preview of one of the hundreds of data sets that will be available on TRD Pro — the one-stop real estate terminal that provides you with all the data and market information you need. The past year has been a devastating one for the hotel industry, but Extended Stay America weathered the storm. North America’s largest integrated hotel owner/operator kept all 560 of its hotels open through the worst months of

Watch: How Barbara Corcoran Built A Career In Real Estate

Posted: 06 Jul 2021 05:15 AM PDT

Real estate is all about whom you know, from the biggest builders to the top brokers. TRD knows them all. And now we’re sitting down with the biggest names in the business to understand how they climbed the ladder — or made their own. No matter what niche of the industry you’re in, these Master Classes were made for you. Get started here. Barbara Corcoran has one of the most recognizable names in real estate.

Preservation fund weighs $6M purchase in East Hampton

Posted: 06 Jul 2021 04:30 AM PDT

The community preservation fund is making a big splash at Gardiners Bay. The town board is considering purchasing a 5-acre, bluff-front parcel on the water near Albert’s Landing, according to the East Hampton Press. The town would team up with Salvatore Graziano, a neighboring homeowner, on the $9.3 million acquisition. Graziano offered $3.3 million and an adjacent 1.5-acre lot, with the town’s preservation fund picking up the remaining $6 million. As the little undeveloped waterfront

Owners’ chance for emissions cap break is over

Posted: 06 Jul 2021 04:00 AM PDT

The window for certain property owners to apply for a break from the city’s emission caps has closed. Owners had until June 30 to apply for a temporary adjustment to emission limits set by Local Law 97. Under the measure, buildings larger than 25,000 square feet must start meeting new greenhouse-gas emission levels in 2024. The rules are intended to help the city meet its goal of cutting emissions 40 percent by 2030 and 80