The Real Deal - New York Real Estate News

Dermot, PGGM fund UWS acquisition with $260M Helaba loan

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 03:11 PM PDT

Dermot Company and Dutch pension fund PGGM landed a $260 million mortgage to fund their acquisition of Upper West Side apartment complex 101 West End Avenue. The lender for the new loan is German firm Landesbank Hessen-Thüringen. Landesbank, also known as Helaba, assumed the $122.3 million unpaid balance from a 2013 mortgage provided by Fannie Mae and the Bank of New York Mellon. The loan package also includes $137.7 million in new financing. The property is […]

Lending tree: Real estate debt funds now have $57B to deploy

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 03:00 PM PDT

Real estate debt funds have a mountain of money to deploy, a staggering amount that could lead to more lending on risky projects, some industry pros say. These funds now have $57 billion to lend as construction loans, bridge loans and other risky debt, according to the Wall Street Journal. “People are concerned about all that capital chasing limited opportunities,” said Tom Carr, head of private debt at alternative capital tracker Preqin. Following the financial […]

This is the latest media company moving to One World Trade

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 02:30 PM PDT

Another firm is joining the roster of media tenants at One World Trade Center. Sports media company DAZN Group signed a 10-year lease, the Durst Organization and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey said in a statement. DAZN is taking 50,700 square feet on the 72nd floor and part of the 71st floor. The landlord was represented by Durst’s Eric Engelhardt and Karen Kuznick — and the Newmark Knight Frank team of […]

This Soho loft owner tried to evict a tenant. Then she was arrested

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 02:00 PM PDT

A landlord who repeatedly complained about a tenant who allegedly owes more than $28,000 in rent and fees was arrested on charges of harassment. Bonnie Rychlak, 67, faces charges of aggravated harassment for allegedly calling and threatening her subletter, Ted Owen, the New York Daily News reported. Rychlak, claiming that he threw loud parties that disrupted neighbors and was behind on rent, had moved to evict Owen earlier this month. But the tenant claimed he […]

REBNY’s Michael Slattery is stepping down

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 01:30 PM PDT

Michael Slattery, the Real Estate Board of New York’s longtime head of research, is retiring after more than 30 years at the industry organization. REBNY President John Banks announced Slattery’s pending retirement at the group’s members’ luncheon Tuesday afternoon at the Ziegfeld ballroom in Midtown. Slattery took a hold of the research team at time before public records were widely available online, and transformed the department into a trusted source of information for the industry. […]

Sales of sites in Opportunity Zones up 80%

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 01:00 PM PDT

Property owners in designated Opportunity Zones are now seeing their sales prices and asking prices spike since the tax incentive program was announced last year. Sales of development sites in the 8,700 designated zones across the country increased 80 percent in the first three quarters of 2018 year over year, according to the Wall Street Journal, citing data from Real Capital Analytics. Opportunity Zones was included in President Trump’s tax overhaul plan, designed to help […]

The Wing wants to bring daycare into co-working spaces

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 12:30 PM PDT

Women-only co-working company The Wing will start offering child daycare services to its members. The offering, dubbed Little Wing, will pilot at one of the firm’s five locations, Bloomberg reported. “Being a parent is a full time job,” Wing co-founder Lauren Kassan told the news outlet. “It’s really important for us to offer solutions to our members who are parents.” She claimed that the offering will be “a lot cheaper” than other private daycare centers. […]

Brooklyn is one of the country’s top real estate markets to watch: report

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 12:00 PM PDT

In real estate terms, Brooklyn seems like it has already arrived, but but evidently there’s more room for growth. The borough ranked as the No. 2 overall U.S. market to watch in the annual “Emerging Trends in Real Estate” survey, which also put Miami and Los Angeles near the top of the pack. Chicago came in at a middling 49 out of the 79 biggest real estate markets nationwide, down seven spots from last year […]

El Fassi Realty lands $133M loan for Uniqlo’s Herald Square site

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 11:15 AM PDT

UPDATED, Oct. 23, 2018, 5:10 p.m.: El Fassi Realty, a partnership between Oved Group and investor Charles Ishay, landed a $133 million mortgage for an office and retail building that is home to Uniqlo’s Herald Square location. Safra National Bank and Banque J. Safra Sarasin, two companies owned by Syrian billionaire Joseph Safra, provided the financing for 31 West 34th Street, an 11-story, 275,600-square-foot property that sits between Fifth and Sixth avenues, according to records filed […]

Carpenters finalize controversial deal with Related for 50 Hudson Yards

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 10:35 AM PDT

A highly contentious construction agreement between Related Companies and the New York City District Council of Carpenters was approved on Friday — following some speculation that the contract even existed. The union voted on the deal on Friday, two months after the developer announced that it had reached an agreement to increase the union’s presence on 50 Hudson Yards and the Western Yards. Back in August, Building and Construction Trades Council President Gary LaBarbera stated […]

The New York Wheel’s demise marks one of the largest EB-5 failures ever

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 10:02 AM PDT

The New York Wheel is officially dead, putting an end to an ambitious project that was marred by years of delays, cost overruns and infighting. Project spokesperson Cristyne Nicholas announced the decision on Tuesday. The news was first reported by the Staten Island Advance. “After years of planning, the developers of The New York Wheel announce, with great disappointment, that the dream of building a world class attraction in Staten Island will unfortunately not come […]

AG Underwood sues Queens landlords for manipulating 421a program

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 10:00 AM PDT

A pair of Queens landlords spent years cheating the state out of almost $500,000 in property taxes by manipulating the 421a program, according to a lawsuit from the New York State Attorney General’s Office. The lawsuit seeks to ban Queens landlords Ram Cohen, Eldad Cohen and their company ERC Holding, LLC from participating in New York’s real estate industry. It also aims to force them to repay the property taxes they dodged, along with the […]

Follow The Real Deal’s Deal Sheet on Instagram!

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 09:30 AM PDT

Shaya Sonnenschein and Shaya Ackerman of Meridian Capital Group represented the owner, Marx Development Group. The loan was issued by Mack Real Estate Credit Strategies. #commercialrealestate #nycrealestate #trdny #trddealsheet #nyc #nycloans #trdloans A post shared by The Real Deal’s Deal Sheet (@trddeals) on Jun 20, 2018 at 10:17am PDT The Real Deal’s Deal Sheet is on Instagram! Our latest social media channel features snaps of retail and office leases, financing acquisitions and commercial and residential […]

Opendoor is testing co-listing agreements with agent teams

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 09:00 AM PDT

Home-flipping startup Opendoor is testing co-listing properties with agents outside the company. The company has selected about a dozen agent teams for its “preferred agent partnership,” Inman reported. The program gives Opendoor the prospect of more deals while the agents get the company’s referral fee and chance to market its for-sale property. Opendoor is seeking to add agent teams across the country, the report said. The company wants to reach 50 markets by the end […]

Amazon to open cashier-free store in NYC

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 08:30 AM PDT

The retail robots are here. Amazon will open its first New York City cashier-less store at Brookfield Place. The e-tailer’s Amazon Go will open in the Winter Garden atrium at the Lower Manhattan complex next to the Oliver Peoples eyewear store at and the 200 Vesey Street office tower, Recode reported. The store – which uses censors, cameras and computer vision to automatically ring up purchases without a cashier as customers leave – is one […]

WeWork gobbles up another office building

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 08:01 AM PDT

WeWork signed a lease for the full 115,000 square feet of office space at Columbia Property Trust’s 149 Madison Avenue in Midtown South, the companies announced. Sitting at the corner of Madison Avenue and East 32nd Street, the building stands 12 stories tall and included 6,600 square feet of retail, which Columbia said it is in active talks to lease. Terms of the deal were not available. WeWork, which is backed by SoftBank Group’s Vision […]

Jumaane Williams eyes public advocate office after primary defeat

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 07:30 AM PDT

After coming close to becoming the state’s lieutenant governor, City Council member Jumaane Williams is now eying the role of city public advocate. Williams lost the nomination for lieutenant governor to Kathy Hochul by 6 percentage points in September’s primary but beat out the incumbent in New York City by more than 60,000 votes. Williams, a former tenant advocate and an outspoken member of the City Council’s Housing and Buildings Committee, had previously indicated that […]

Hamptons Cheat Sheet: Golf club and business park score Southampton approvals … & more

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 07:00 AM PDT

Golf club expansion and business park development advance after Southampton OK The Southampton Town Planning board will allow two proposed projects on the border between Bridgehampton and Water Mill to move forward without more archaeological or environmental review, 27east reported. The Atlantic Golf Club hopes to build a 3,643-square-foot teaching facility and expand its driving range on its more than 200-acre course. The board ruled the teaching facility, which will mostly be underground, won’t significantly […]

SoftBank’s Masa Son pulls out of Saudi conference after journalist’s death

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 06:35 AM PDT

SoftBank Group’s Masayoshi Son is the latest executive to pull out of an investment conference in Riyadh following the death of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Son cancelled plans to attend the Future Investment Initiative on Tuesday, the conference’s first day, the New York Times reported. The news comes on the heels of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan publicly spoke about the killing of Khashoggi at the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul. Other executives have also backed out […]

Activist investor Bill Ackman scoops up late author’s UWS co-op

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 06:00 AM PDT

Pershing Square Capital Management founder Bill Ackman is in contract to buy an Upper West Side penthouse formerly owned by late feminist author Nancy Friday. The 13-room unit at 6 West 77th Street had an asking price of $22.5 million, according to StreetEasy. Friday, author of the book “My Secret Garden,” lived in the home from 1979 until her death last year. The apartment was listed in May by Brown Harris Stevens. The proceeds of […]

WiredScore raises $9M in Series A

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 05:30 AM PDT

WiredScore, the building connectivity rating company that was once majority-owned by Jared Kushner, has raised $9 million in a new venture funding round. Fifth Wall Ventures, Bessemer Venture Partners, Sterling.VC, Legal & General, KingSett Capital, U+I, Town Centre Securities, MOMENI Digital Ventures and Savitt Partners participated in the round, the companies announced Monday. Founded in 2013 by Arie Barendrecht, WiredScore runs a rating system that measures the digital connectivity of commercial properties. It charges landlords […]

Are firms like Compass and Douglas Elliman too big to fail? Or just too big?

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 05:00 AM PDT

Months after news broke of Compass’ bombshell acquisition of Pacific Union, the resultant shock waves are still hitting all corners of the market. With Pacific Union’s 1,700 agents and 54 offices under the Compass banner, Robert Reffkin’s tech unicorn is now the largest independent brokerage in California, according to Real Trends. The Pacific Union acquisition comes exactly one year after another New York residential giant, Douglas Elliman, gained a bigger foothold on the West Coast […]

Architecture review: 35 Hudson Yards is Deconstructivist all grown up

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 04:30 AM PDT

Now that 35 Hudson Yards is sufficiently underway, we can safely compare the once-abstract design to the reality rising out of the ground. Like all the buildings at the $25 billion Hudson Yards development, it is a one-off structure, employing many of the devices that make up the regularly (and, perhaps overly) used Deconstructivist style. This new building — which was designed by David Childs of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill — exploits a certain visual […]

The $70B loophole, or: How to turn your mansion into an offshore account

Posted: 23 Oct 2018 04:00 AM PDT

In the fall of 2016, Roger Ailes was by all accounts a very wealthy man. Fox News had just pushed him out from the company he built over allegations of sexual harassment, but paid him $40 million for his troubles. So he did what many other rich retirees before him have done: he bought a house in Florida. Through a trust, Ailes paid $36 million in cash for a six-bedroom, 12,747-square-foot mansion in Palm Beach. […]