The Real Deal - New York Real Estate News

Canon renews 34K sf at SL Green’s 125 Park

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 03:30 PM PDT

Camera and photocopier company Canon Solutions America renewed a lease for its roughly 34,000-square-foot offices at SL Green Realty’s 125 Park Avenue. Canon renewed its space in the 570,000-square-foot building between East 42nd and 41st streets for 10.6 years, SL Green announced Wednesday as it released its quarterly earnings. Other tenants in the building include Newmark Knight Frank, law firm of Meister, Seelig & Fein and Pandora Media. The city included 125 Park on a […]

In major pivot, Compass to license its tech

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 03:00 PM PDT

UPDATED, July 18, 8:15 p.m.: Since landing $450 million in funding from Softbank last year, Compass has been aggressively scooping up brokerages and agents across the country. And now, the venture-backed company is employing a new line of business: licensing its technology to other firms. On Wednesday, Compass announced its inaugural licensing deal with Leading Edge Real Estate Group, a 200-agent firm with offices in Boston and Eastern Massachusetts, which until recently was a franchise […]

Cannabis Cubicles: Developer repositions LA building for pot-related companies

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 02:30 PM PDT

Bow West Capital is giving new meaning to “green spaces” in commercial real estate. The Santa Monica-based developer is repositioning a seven-story office building in Downtown Los Angeles to cater to cannabis-related industries, the company announced Wednesday. Located at 718 S. Hill Street in the Historic Core neighborhood, the 67,000-square-foot building will feature several floors of co-working space, private office, a rooftop deck, art gallery, retail and a 5,000-square-foot restaurant — all dedicated for people […]

WeWork takes 6 floors at Moinian’s 450 PAS

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 02:00 PM PDT

WeWork is taking six floors at the Moinian Group’s 450-460 Park Avenue South in Murray Hill. The co-working firm signed a lease for approximately 50,000 square feet, a source told The Real Deal. That accounts for half of the 12-story building, which Joseph Moinian bought in 1982. In a previous interview, he described the property as his first “serious office building.” Its current tenant roster includes tech company ShopKeep and co-working space provider Work Better. […]

South Bronx senior housing project snags $57M loan

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 01:30 PM PDT

Nonprofit group Volunteers of America landed a $56.6 million loan for a planned senior housing complex in the South Bronx, according to records filed with the city today. The property, at 112 East Clarke Place in Highbridge, will be the future site of a 14-story residential building. Permits for the project were filed last August. Once it’s built, the property is expected to contain 122 units across about 68,000 square feet of space. The site […]

Join Moishe Mana, Jackie Soffer, Mauricio Umansky and more at TRD’s South Florida showcase + forum

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 01:00 PM PDT

The Real Deal’s fifth annual Real Estate Showcase + Forum in South Florida is shaping up to be our best event yet. Developers Moishe Mana, Louis Birdman, Kieran Bowers and Michael Stern have signed on for our top developers panel; Turnberry’s Jackie Soffer and East End Capital’s Jonathon Yormak will be among the experts sharing insights on our commercial panel; The Agency’s Mauricio Umansky — also of “The Real Housewives” fame — will talk about […]

Westchester & Fairfield Cheat Sheet: Cap on SALT deduction hurting Westchester home sales… & more

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 12:30 PM PDT

New cap on state and local tax deductions hurting Westchester home sales A new federal tax law that caps deductions on state and local taxes at $10,000 has been detrimental to home sales in Westchester County. Sales were down by 18 percent in the second quarter of 2018 compared to the second quarter of 2017 — the biggest decrease since 2011, according to Bloomberg. That may be because buyers need more time to process the cap […]

Commerzbank sublets 43K sf at Brookfield Place to IT consultant

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 12:00 PM PDT

German bank Commerzbank AG sublet rough 43,000 square feet at its Brookfield Place headquarters to IT consulting firm Virtusa Corporation. Virtusa, headquartered in Westborough, Massachusetts, signed a 10-year sublease for the full 34th floor at 225 Liberty Street, sources told The Real Deal. Commerzbank signed a 175,000-square-foot lease in 2011 with Brookfield Property Partners at 225 Liberty Street, which was then known as 2 World Financial Center, and over the past few years has looked […]

Premier Equities sells retail condos for $20M

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 11:30 AM PDT

Premier Equities sold a pair of retail properties in the East Village and Tribeca to Queens-based investor Athena Vrettos for $20.1 million, sources told The Real Deal. Premier, headed by founding partners Yaron Jacobi and Uzi Ben-Abraham, paid a total of $11.45 million between 2015 and 2017 to buy the retail condominiums at 13 First Avenue and 271 Church Street (also known as 90 Franklin Street), property records show. Both retail properties are fully leased, […]

Here’s what’s behind Airbnb’s latest tactic in City Council showdown

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 11:00 AM PDT

When the New York City Council votes today to force Airbnb to disclose information on every one of its New York City listings or face $25,000 fines for each, the $31 billion unicorn will take a heavy punch to the gut. But it’s already found a new way to fight back: the company will pay legal fees for a host alleging the city unfairly targeted him for enforcement after he testified in favor of Airbnb […]

Leslie Alexander made $2.1B selling the Houston Rockets last year. Here’s how he fared at the Baccarat.

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 10:30 AM PDT

Leslie Alexander sold the Houston Rockets for a $2.1 billion profit last year, but maybe real estate isn’t his game? The former basketball team owner and businessman sold his Baccarat condominium at 20 West 53rd Street for $17.5 million, about than $3.1 million less than what he paid in 2015. The buyer, listed in property records as Miamat LLC, closed on the deal Wednesday, according to Department of Finance records. Alexander’s pad was listed with […]

Home-building across US declines again; lowest in 9 months

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 10:00 AM PDT

New home construction has fallen and it can’t get up. Residential home starts nationwide fell 12.3 percent in June, to an annualized rate of 1.17 million, the government reported, according to Bloomberg. The latest figures marked the biggest drop in home construction since November 2016. And couple that with a 2.2 percent drop in permits — a gauge of future activity — it made for the weakest activity since in nine months. That low-point coincided […]

WATCH: Mary Ann Tighe on whether real estate needs a #MeToo moment, rebuilding Lower Manhattan after 9/11 and more

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 09:30 AM PDT

 On the evening of Sept. 11, 2001, CBRE tri-state CEO Mary Ann Tighe had a chance encounter with landlord and developer Larry Silverstein. “I ran into him — he was about to go into a place to have dinner, and I ran into him on the street on the Upper East Side,” Tighe told The Real Deal’s Hiten Samtani during a wide-ranging video interview. “We were standing in front of each other and I began to […]

Hampshire Properties lands $115M construction loan for Midwood project

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 09:00 AM PDT

Hampshire Properties has landed a $115 million loan for its multifamily project at 1277 East 14th Street in Midwood. The loan, provided by Square Mile Capital, will finance all of the 302-unit property, which will stand eight stories tall and span 265,000 square feet, according to Commercial Observer. The project is located on the former site of the Shulamith School for Girls, and amenities at the building will include a gym, a game room and […]

Why the city is handing private developers 95 resi buildings

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 08:30 AM PDT

The City Council is about to let ownership of 95 rental buildings and co-ops transfer to private developers. The deals will take place through a process known as Third Party Transfer, which allows developers that the city chooses to take ownership of multifamily buildings with outstanding debts, according to Politico. The latest batch of buildings consists of 56 rentals and 39 co-ops in the Bronx, Brooklyn and Queens that the city says are in disrepair […]

Retail rents in Manhattan keep going down

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 08:00 AM PDT

Retail rents keep declining in New York, and the city’s poshest neighborhoods are not exempt. In fact, they are among the hardest hit. The most expensive real estate in Manhattan is on Fifth Avenue around the Plaza Hotel, where rents dropped by 13.5 percent from the first quarter to the second quarter this year, according to Bloomberg’s analysis of a CBRE Group report. This was the largest decline out of the 16 neighborhoods the company […]

Is co-living’s awkward phase permanent?

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 07:30 AM PDT

The nondescript, three-story brick apartment building on Marcy Avenue, between Vernon and Myrtle Avenues, in Bedford-Stuyvesant might seem like a youth hostel to the untrained eye. In a shared kitchen, two 20-somethings sit glued to their laptops, surrounded by used furniture, while an unfinished puzzle canopies a nearby table. Upstairs, open bedroom doors reveal drab wooden bunk beds, and out front, a police detective surveys the scene of a reported crime. Two and a half […]

NYCHA told feds about less than half of elevated blood lead levels

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 07:00 AM PDT

NYCHA has reported less than half of the elevated blood lead level cases in its buildings to the feds over the past 12 months. The agency has said publicly that it had 40 such cases between last July and June, but it reported just 17 of them to the Department of Housing and Urban Development, according to the New York Post. A rule that took effect on July 13, 2017 requires NYCHA to report all […]

British steakhouse Hawksmoor ditches 3 WTC for Park Ave. South

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 06:30 AM PDT

Hawksmoor, a famed British steakhouse, is backing out of its deal at Westfield’s corner of 3 World Trade Center and will instead open its first U.S. location at 287 Park Avenue South. Hawksmoor will open the 180-seat eatery at the former United Charities Building in 2019, according to the New York Post. Co-working company Spaces just signed a 100,000-square-foot lease for the seventh through ninth floors of the same building. In 2016, Hawksmoor said it […]

Oppenheim Architecture’s “Spirit of Place” explores new terrain for design

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 06:00 AM PDT

Not every architect would choose to express his work through a haiku about dunes. But Oppenheim Architecture’s new book “Spirit of Place” does just that — along with 17-syllable meditations on the desert, sea, peninsulas, canyons, rivers and streams. “I really appreciated the simplicity and elegance of reducing things down to their essence,” Chad Oppenheim, principal of his eponymous firm, told The Real Deal. “The haiku is saying more with less.” This is a prevailing […]

Gap sues Westfield for alleged overcharges at more than 2 dozen malls

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 05:30 AM PDT

Gap is dragging its landlord Westfield into court over disputed common charges — a disagreement that could become more common amid the tough retail environment. The retailer filed its lawsuit in California state court in Los Angeles in May, claiming Westfield used fraudulent measuring techniques that forced Gap to pay more than its share of expenses at more than two dozen shopping centers, the Wall Street Journal reported. Standard mall leases usually allow landlords to charge […]

Don’t freak out (too much) about Five Below on Fifth, brokers say

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 05:00 AM PDT

Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue has long been known to house shops for some of the world’s most iconic luxury brands: Tiffany & Co., Rolex, Prada, Gucci and more. So it came as a surprise when Five Below, a discount retailer whose calling card is not selling anything for more than $5, announced it would open a flagship on the famous street. Multiple retail brokers acknowledged that this was a bit out of the ordinary, but they […]

Architecture review: 125 Greenwich is original, but not radical

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 04:30 AM PDT

Rising two blocks south of the World Trade Center site, Rafael Viñoly’s latest building, 125 Greenwich Street, was supposed to be Lower Manhattan’s answer to 432 Park Avenue. The latter building — which stands 1,396 feet tall, and which Viñoly also designed — is visible from most anywhere in the five boroughs and is the tallest residential building in the Western Hemisphere. But at 88 stories and 912 feet, 125 Greenwich will be a lot […]

Minor alterations sometimes take decades to complete. Here’s why

Posted: 18 Jul 2018 04:00 AM PDT

The year 2000 was big one for Stuyvesant Town. MetLife, the original developers of the massive apartment complex, became a publicly traded company in April that year. By the fall, big changes were in the works – a whopping 58 alteration permits were filed for “replacement of wet walls” throughout the development, covering nearly every building in Stuyvesant Town proper and adjacent Peter Cooper Village. Since then, Stuy-Town has been sold and defaulted on, […]