The Real Deal - New York Real Estate News

Sam Chang gets $160M refi for Hyatt Place hotel

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 03:30 PM PDT

Sam Chang’s McSam Group has landed a $160 million refinancing for an under-construction Hyatt Place hotel in the Garment District. The new debt from Deutsche Bank at 350 West 39th Street replaces a $95 million debt package from Bank OZK – then known as Bank of the Ozarks – from 2017, and consists of a $32 million project loan, a $67 million building loan, and a $61 million senior loan, according to city records recorded […]

Mystery buyer snags two condos at 220 CPS

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 03:05 PM PDT

Another week, another anonymous buyer at the ultra-luxe 220 Central Park South tower. But this time, it’s a little different. The same mystery buyer bought two condominium units at the building on the same day. The unknown person bought unit 41A for $23.4 million, or roughly $7,500 per square foot, and unit 19G for $1.8 million, or roughly $3,600 per square foot. The purchases were made through an anonymous LLC called “Pez Loco Partners,” according […]

A new class action lawsuit could upend the real estate business as we know it

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 02:00 PM PDT

It takes aim at some of the central tenets of the U.S. real estate business: Multiple Listing Services and buyer’s broker’s commissions. A new class action lawsuit alleges that the National Association of Realtors, along with the “Big Four” — Realogy, HomeServices of America, RE/MAX and Keller Williams — violated federal antitrust law by conspiring to require home sellers to pay buyer’s broker’s commissions at inflated rates. The suit was first reported by Inman. The […]

Brookfield puts massive Putnam Portfolio up for sale

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 01:30 PM PDT

Brookfield Property Partners is officially looking to sell one of New York’s largest portfolios of market-rate housing for $1.5 billion. Brookfield listed the six Manhattan properties – known collectively as the Putnam Portfolio and spanning some 4,000 units – with a team at Cushman & Wakefield led by Doug Harmon and Adam Spies, marketing materials show. Representatives for Brookfield Property Partners and Urban American Management, which owns a small stake in the portfolio, could not […]

With gun to their head, Industry City agrees to delay rezoning application

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 01:00 PM PDT

Industry City’s owners have agreed to delay their rezoning application for the 30-acre complex, days after City Council member Carlos Menchaca said that the plan would be “dead on arrival” without more time for community input. Menchaca and Sunset Park’s Community Board 7 argued that the city’s Uniform Land Use Review Process (ULURP) does not give local stakeholders enough time to fully evaluate the impact of a rezoning. City Council generally defers to the local […]

Harry Macklowe is one parcel closer to building his $1B Midtown office tower

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 12:52 PM PDT

Harry Macklowe’s dream of building one more soaring skyscraper in Midtown picked up a bit of steam this week. The octogenarian developer on Monday closed on the purchase of a six-story rental building at 5 East 51st Street from Noam Management for $44 million, according to property records. His company Macklowe Properties funded the deal with a roughly $124 million mortgage from Fortress Investment Group. Macklowe, who was married last week following a bitter divorce […]

AllianceBernstein nearing massive relocation deal at The Spiral

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 12:10 PM PDT

Investment giant AllianceBernstein is nearing a deal to to take 200,000 square feet at Tishman Speyer’s Hudson Yards development. The investment firm – which is relocating its headquarters and 1,050 employees to Nashville – had been looking at Tishman’s The Spiral, along with Related Companies’ 50 Hudson Yards, to house its smaller staff. However, it now appears Alliance has decided to move forward with The Spiral, according to Crain’s. The firm currently leases 855,000 square […]

Long Island Cheat Sheet: Mineola multifamily complex trades for $150M, JLL scales bank Ronkonkoma arena plan… & more

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 11:30 AM PDT

Friedkin Realty buys Mineola multifamily complex for $150M The Allure and Hudson House apartments in Mineola have been sold for $150 million to the San Francisco-based Friedkin Realty Group, according to The Real Deal. Friedkin Realty bought the properties from J.P. Morgan Asset Management. JLL’s Thomas Walsh, Joseph Garibaldi, Kelly Gaines, Ray Ruiz, Katelyn Brovsky and Heather Lombardi facilitated the sale and brought in the buyer. The brokerage told TRD the transaction is the second […]

Use TRD’s new 3-D development map to get a jump on the competition

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 10:45 AM PDT

 Trying to keep up with the latest projects underway in New York City? Check out The Real Deal’s new interactive map, where you can track more than 16,000 buildings in various stages of development across the five boroughs. This critical resource is for subscribers only, so if you haven’t joined us yet, sign up now. The map is updated daily by TRD’s data team and shows projects in every phase of development, from the moment plans […]

PHOTOS: Top RE execs raise their glasses at the Met Council’s cocktail reception

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 10:00 AM PDT

Some of the industry’s biggest players attended the Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty’s real estate cocktail reception at the Mandarin Oriental on Feb. 26. The organization, which provides social services to poor New Yorkers, welcomed Joseph Allerhand (Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP), Adam Leitman Bailey, Stanley Chera (Crown Acquisitions), Lawrence Cohen (Pembroke Companies), Justin Ehrlich (Churchill Real Estate), Brian Feil (Feil Organization), Abraham Fruchthandler (FBE Limited), Jeffrey Feil (Feil Organization), Lloyd Goldman (BLDG Management), Met Council CEO David Greenfield, Amir Korangy (The Real Deal), Regina Krumholz […]

Developers want to build senior housing under a new city program. They say HPD is holding them up

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 09:30 AM PDT

Confusion is mounting over a three-year old city program that offers developers density and height boosts in exchange for setting aside housing for seniors in their buildings. Affordable Independent Residences for Seniors, a program launched as part of the Zoning for Quality and Affordability text amendment in March 2016, allows developers to increase the scale of their projects if they dedicate a portion of their projects to seniors. The issue, according to developers and real […]

Brooklyn’s luxury market saw just 7 contracts signed last week

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 09:00 AM PDT

There were just seven contracts signed in Brooklyn’s luxury market last week for a total of about $18.3 million. The properties were split between five condominiums and two townhouses, and they went for an average price of about $2.6 million, according to the latest report from Stribling & Associates. The firm defines the borough’s luxury market as all homes priced at $2 million or higher. Both numbers were down from the week before, when the […]

“Everybody’s been poached”: Inside a year of agent moves at NYC’s top resi brokerages

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 08:30 AM PDT

During a year of market turmoil in 2018, brokers hopped, skipped and jumped between New York’s major residential brokerages. We tracked the moves of brokers between five of the city’s major brokerages — Douglas Elliman, Corcoran, Compass, Brown Harris Stevens and Stribling — to see who went where, and why. To quantify broker movement between firms, The Real Deal compared licensing data from the Department of State’s Division of Licensing Services from the fourth quarter […]

Catsimatidis lands $200M refi for Downtown Brooklyn project

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 08:00 AM PDT

Santander Bank has provided John Catsimatidis’ Red Apple Group with a $200 million refinancing package for its Downtown Brooklyn project the Eagle. The debt for the 32-story project at 86 Fleet Place consolidates and replaces $170 million in financing that Bank of America gave the project in 2015, according to Commercial Observer. Red Apple completed the tower in 2017, and it is the final residential piece of his four-building development along Myrtle Avenue. The other […]

Realogy taps J&J exec as new CFO amid cost-cutting push

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 07:30 AM PDT

As it looks to whittle expenses and reduce debt, Realogy has tapped Charlotte Simonelli — a 47-year-old former executive at Johnson & Johnson — as its new chief financial officer and treasurer. Simonelli, who will report to CEO Ryan Schneider, is set to start March 25, Realogy announced Monday. She replaces longtime CFO Tony Hull, who stepped down abruptly in November. Interim CFO Timothy Gustavson will stay at Realogy as chief accounting officer and controller. […]

The Manhattan luxury market’s streak of topping 20 weekly sales is over

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 07:00 AM PDT

Manhattan’s luxury market saw 15 contracts signed last week for a total of about $118 million, ending its streak of topping 20 sales at three weeks, according to the latest report from Olshan Realty. The contracts signed at $4 million or above were split between 10 condominiums and five co-ops. The number of contracts decreased by seven from the week before, and the dollar volume decreased by about $97 million. The top contract last week […]

Corey Johnson’s MTA reform plan targets controversial Scaffold Law

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 06:30 AM PDT

City Council Speaker Corey Johnson’s plan to reform the MTA would include changing the city’s Scaffold Law, which places 100 percent of the liability on owners and contractors for workplace injuries. Johnson’s plan says the law increases costs to cover negligence lawsuits, claiming that the cost of insuring a New York construction project is 10 times higher than insuring construction projects in other states, according to the New York Post. Other states use a “comparative […]

This new City Council bill could slow evictions of small businesses

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 06:00 AM PDT

A bill that will soon be proposed in the City Council would provide small businesses in New York City with free legal counsel if they are facing eviction. City Councilman Mark Levine plans to introduce the bill on Wednesday, and it is based on a similar program for residential tenants, according to the Wall Street Journal. There have been more than 3,900 commercial evictions in New York City over the past two years, and the […]

Celebrity megamansions making life hell for West Village residents

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 05:30 AM PDT

West 11th Street is a great place to live in New York City if you’re a celebrity, but being one of their neighbors doesn’t seem as much fun. A trio of construction projects are making life difficult on the corridor, with issues including reduced parking, scaffolds and dumpsters, according to the New York Post. Actors Matthew Broderick and Sarah Jessica Parker, Chipotle founder Steve Ells and SoftBank COO Marcelo Claure all have projects going on […]

Shelter in place: A look at the biggest office leases inked on Long Island in 2018

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 05:00 AM PDT

On paper it looks as though Long Island’s office leasing market had a bit of a bounce back last year, with landlords closing deals at a rate that far outpaced a sluggish 2017. The 10 biggest leases of 2018 amounted to almost 600,000 square feet, nearly twice the volume of the year before, according to TRD’s analysis of brokerage data. But many of those deals were renewals or restructurings. In the top leasing deal in […]

Can real estate lobby the left?

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 04:30 AM PDT

Cocktail hour at the “Liar’s Ball” — the Real Estate Board of New York’s annual gala — is all about being seen. Brokers and developers float to and from the open bar, pose for pictures with their peers and public officials, and often sneak out before the main event. At this year’s banquet, though, there were two glaring absences: Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio. One week before the largest real estate event […]

These were the top 10 outer borough loans last month

Posted: 11 Mar 2019 04:00 AM PDT

The prettiest projects at the outer boroughs dance for lenders last month were developments in Brooklyn and Queens. Brooklyn had six loans in the top 10, including the top three, while Queens had the other four. The Bronx and Staten Island did not appear on last month’s list at all. The largest loan of the month was $245 million from AIG to Midtown Equities and the HK Organization for their recapitalization of Empire Stores in […]