The Real Deal - New York Real Estate News

“I feel like home”: Trump touts economy, gushes over agents at NAR conference

Posted: 17 May 2019 04:05 PM PDT

“I feel like home,” President Donald Trump said as he took the podium in front of a crowd of real estate agents on Friday. Trump received a warm welcome from the National Association of Realtors at the trade organization’s Legislative Meetings and Trade Expo in Washington, D.C., where he spoke for more than an hour. He is the first sitting president to speak at the conference since George W. Bush spoke in 2005. Trump — […]

The 2019 ICSC party guide

Posted: 17 May 2019 03:12 PM PDT

While retail brokers may be chasing a different game ICSC this year, the parties remain the main attraction of the four-day conference. Tens of thousands of real estate brokers are heading to Las Vegas for the event, which has 29,000 attendees signed up as of May 13. While that figure is on par with previous years, a distressed climate within the retail sector has led some firms to trade big parties for intimate dinners or […]

What to expect at ICSC in Las Vegas in 2019

Posted: 17 May 2019 02:26 PM PDT

Long gone are the days of the two-decade flagship lease. Now, brokers attending this year’s International Council of Shopping Centers conference in Las Vegas will be courting a new tenant: online companies seeking short, nimble leases. This year’s event, which will be held from May 19 to 22, comes at a time when shopping malls across the country are shuttering, and global clothing retailers can’t afford the rents charged on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. Instead […]

Sam Zell looking to go public with four Equity firms overseas

Posted: 17 May 2019 01:15 PM PDT

Sam Zell’s Equity International is considering taking four of its companies public in Brazil, Colombia, Mexico and India. The Chicago-based investment firm is “seriously evaluating” initial public offerings for Indian lodging company Samhi, Colombian lodging company Decameron, Mexican mall operator Acosta Verde and Brazilian parking lot firm Estapar, Equity CEO Tom Heneghan told Bloomberg. Estapar, a Sao Paulo-based network with more than 300,000 parking spaces, would be one of the first. Sao Paulo “has few […]

Crowdfunding firm Prodigy is broke, former exec claims in defamation lawsuit

Posted: 17 May 2019 12:30 PM PDT

A former Prodigy Network executive is suing the real-estate crowdfunding platform and CEO Rodrigo Niño, alleging that the company’s “cash difficulties” aren’t his fault — they’re Niño’s. Vincent Mikolay was named interim chief operating officer at Prodigy in December 2017 and became the permanent replacement a few months later. In his complaint, filed Thursday in New York County Supreme Court, Mikolay also claims that Prodigy hasn’t paid him his shares of Class B incentive units […]

Mark your calendars: These are NYC’s top real estate events next week

Posted: 17 May 2019 11:45 AM PDT

Here are a couple of real estate events worth checking out next week! On May 21, the NAIOP NYC is holding an event on Opportunity Zones at Cushman & Wakefield, 1290 Avenue of the Americas from 8 a.m. to 10 a.m. This event will feature a panel discussion that delves into how Opportunity Zones can be utilized in pushing economic growth in New York City’s low-income areas. Speakers include Eric Clement of the New York […]

Things could get “ugly” with rent reforms in Albany

Posted: 17 May 2019 11:00 AM PDT

With New York State rent laws expiring in just under a month, insiders told the New York Daily News that the package of reforms may land in the end-of-session omnibus bill known as the “Big Ugly.” That scenario would see rent law reforms combined with a number of other contentious issues — even marijuana legalization. Cea Weaver of the Upstate Downstate Housing Alliance expects Cuomo to come in on the side of real estate and […]

Renovation kings: The city’s 30 leading general contractors

Posted: 17 May 2019 10:30 AM PDT

This month, The Real Deal ranked the top 30 general contractors doing renovation work. Check out the chart below: Source: TRD analysis of initial alteration (A-1 and A-2) permits issued between April 1, 2018 and March 31, 2018 by the NYC Dept. of Buildings. Renovations, including interior and facade work, were ranked by initial estimated costs listed on DOB permits, which include general construction, structural materials and mechanical systems. The data includes work permitted by the DOB […]

City saw net gain of 4,000 rent stabilized units last year, but there’s a catch

Posted: 17 May 2019 10:00 AM PDT

The city saw a net gain of rent stabilized units last year, though a majority of those apartments will lose their protected status once certain tax breaks expire. In a new report released by the city’s Rent Guidelines Board on Thursday, 11,845 apartments were newly stabilized in 2018, while 7,468 were lost. This made for a net gain of 4,377, Politico reported. A majority — 80 percent — of the new units were created through […]

In addition to building its own tech, Keller Williams is going on an acquisition spree

Posted: 17 May 2019 09:30 AM PDT

As Keller Williams pushes forward with its new focus on tech — launching a new iBuyer program and seeking to copy its competitors — the franchise also hopes to get an extra boost by scooping up other firms. The Austin-based brokerage revealed that it was pursuing an aggressive merger and acquisition strategy in its first-quarter 2019 earnings report, according to Inman. “With our recent moves, many are thinking that we’re just building Kelle, a CRM […]

Despite lawsuit, MDG files plans for 100-unit Fort Greene project

Posted: 17 May 2019 09:00 AM PDT

Despite a lawsuit that alleges illegal spot zoning, MDG Design + Construction on Wednesday pre-filed plans for a 100-unit mixed-use project in Fort Greene, according to the Department of Buildings. The project at 142 South Portland Avenue would stand 13 stories tall and span about 86,000 square feet, split between 76,000 square feet of residential space and 10,000 square feet of community space. The project, which was unanimously approved last year, is currently in the […]

New lawsuits raise question of who should pay homebuyer’s agent

Posted: 17 May 2019 08:30 AM PDT

The long knives are out again for one of American real estate’s oldest and most controversial traditions: requiring home sellers to pay the agents who represent the buyers of their properties. A landmark suit filed in March alleged that the 1.3-million-member National Association of Realtors has conspired with local multiple listing services (MLSs) and with major realty brokerage companies to force sellers who list their homes on an MLS to pay a contractually specified percentage […]

Premier Equities just saved the Flatiron Hotel from foreclosure

Posted: 17 May 2019 07:45 AM PDT

Manhattan’s troubled Flatiron Hotel has found a life boat in Premier Equities. Premier is paying down the debt on the hotel, which was facing foreclosure, and becoming its majority owner, according to Commercial Observer. Tel Aviv-based Israeli Discount Bank provided Premier with $30 million in financing to cover the remaining balance. The entity that owned the hotel, which is tied to Jay Vaswani, had taken out a $25 million CMBS loan from Rialto Capital in […]

SLIDESHOW: Developers grapple with a changed environment while startups look toward an uncertain future at TRD forum

Posted: 17 May 2019 07:00 AM PDT

Despite rising political and economic headwinds, the city’s leading developers remain high on the outlook for real estate in New York City. This optimism, tempered with a new dose of realism, was on display again and again at The Real Deal’s 12th annual New York Showcase and Forum on Wednesday. In the first panel of the day, Larry Silverstein told TRD publisher Amir Korangy that he was still prepared to move ahead with 2 World […]

Moelis, Schwartz talk up the steady upside to affordable development, and the “amazing” NYCHA real estate

Posted: 17 May 2019 06:15 AM PDT

While market-rate developers may ink all the high-profile deals, there’s safety and upside in the affordable game, as long as you have the mind for complicated capital stacks and the stomach for thorny local politics. That was the theme of the discussion on affordable housing between L+M Development Partners’ Ron Moelis and Slate Property Group’s David Schwartz at The Real Deal‘s 12th annual New York showcase on Wednesday. “There’s money to be made in affordable,” […]

US housing starts jump in April amid lower mortgage rates

Posted: 17 May 2019 05:45 AM PDT

The U.S. housing market just received some much needed positive news. Housing starts rose 5.7 percent in April, compared to March, to an adjusted annual rate of 1.24 million, according to data from the U.S. Census Bureau released on Thursday. This number includes both multifamily and single-family homes. The news comes after numerous economic indicators have shown that the housing market is slowing down. Last month, single-family housing starts fell 0.4 percent to 781,000, the […]

Controversial landlord E&M faces potential political storm as it rapidly expands upstate

Posted: 17 May 2019 05:00 AM PDT

E&M Management — a longtime multifamily owner known for buying rent-stabilized buildings in Manhattan, Brooklyn and the Bronx and converting them to market rate — is finding greener pastures beyond the city. The controversial landlord, which owns and manages more than 3,000 apartments in the boroughs, is aggressively expanding its portfolio to upstate New York, where taxes are lower and rental laws are far less stringent. E&M pounced on the Hudson Valley rental market in […]

NYCHA’s new order: A by-the-numbers look at the beleaguered housing authority

Posted: 17 May 2019 04:30 AM PDT

The city’s biggest landlord has been plagued by scandals, hazardous conditions and funding shortfalls. And after Mayor Bill de Blasio and HUD Secretary Ben Carson signed a deal in January settling federal litigation over the mismanagement of roughly 176,000 subsidized apartments, the New York City Housing Authority is in for a major shakeup. The agreement calls for a federal monitor to oversee the agency and requires the city to make an additional $2 billion investment […]

“It’s gonna suck for us”: Real estate sounds off on de Blasio’s presidential bid

Posted: 17 May 2019 04:00 AM PDT

Just three days before he announced his run for President of the United States, Mayor Bill de Blasio held a chaotic press conference at Trump Tower. The stated reason for the event was to promote a forthcoming city law that requires building owners to cut greenhouse gas emissions 40 percent by 2030. But considering he’s long toyed with joining the roughly two dozen candidates making a play for 2020 — not to mention held multiple […]