The Real Deal - New York Real Estate News

Lender schedules foreclosure auction at HFZ’s Nomad site

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 03:58 PM PST

HFZ Capital Group is in danger of losing another project in its embattled development portfolio. Ziel Feldman’s firm is facing foreclosure on the mezzanine position at a NoMad development site where it plans to build a 600,000-square-foot office tower, according to a notice scheduling the UCC auction reviewed by The Real Deal. The mezzanine lender on the site, the Vanbarton Group, has scheduled a UCC foreclosure auction for late March. Representatives for HFZ and Vanbarton

Lawmakers rush to pass more limits on residential evictions

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 03:29 PM PST

State lawmakers are racing to pass legislation before the end of the year to significantly expand upon the existing limits on residential evictions. A legislative memo, reviewed by The Real Deal, outlines what could be included in a new bill, which sources say has yet to be printed. As written in the memo, the measure would freeze all eviction and mortgage foreclosure proceedings for two months. The expanded limits on evictions would apply to both

L&M close to scoring $349M for South Bronx affordable housing development

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 02:34 PM PST

The developer of a major project on the Bronx Harlem River waterfront plans to close on about $349 million in financing next week, with the goal of starting construction in January. L+M Development Partners, led by Ron Moelis, will move forward on its Bronx Point development after being delayed because of the pandemic, the Wall Street Journal reported. The company was supposed to close financing in June. The project will get $238 million in city

Porch.com set to begin trading this week

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 01:36 PM PST

Porch.com gave an early Christmas present to its investors: The home-services startup will start trading on Nasdaq on Dec. 24 after its merger with a blank-check company was finalized. The deal with Proptech Acquisition Corp. closed Wednesday, after shareholders approved the transaction at a special meeting held virtually on Dec. 21. After the vote, shares of the special-purpose acquisition company closed at $12.68, up 25 percent from July when the Porch deal was announced. At

The Closing: Sam Nazarian

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 01:30 PM PST

In a matter of two decades, Sam Nazarian went from Los Angeles nightclub king to luxury hotel mogul to ghost kitchen entrepreneur. The founder and CEO of SBE Entertainment Group, one of the most influential companies in the lifestyle hospitality space, recently sold his remaining stake in the hotel business to go all in on digital restaurant brands. It’s not the first time he’s bet on a budding industry. In the early 2000s, Nazarian took

Two Brooklyn hotel projects file for bankruptcy in one week

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 01:00 PM PST

Two Brooklyn hotel projects with ties to Isaac Hager’s Cornell Realty Management have sought Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the span of a week. The owners of a planned 26-story hotel and residential tower at 159 Broadway in Williamsburg — 159 Broadway Member and WB Bridge Hotel — have filed for bankruptcy, according to Bloomberg News. One of the owners, 159 Broadway Member, shares an address with Cornell Realty. The 235-room project, situated across the

John Tishman’s former weekend retreat in Bedford hits market

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 12:15 PM PST

The former Westchester County home of construction mogul John Tishman, who oversaw the development of the original World Trade Center and Chicago’s John Hancock Tower, is back on the market. The 3,900-square-foot home, located at 147 Mianus River Road in Bedford, New York, is listed for $4 million, according to Mansion Global. Tishman built the home in 1978 as a weekend retreat. After he died in 2016, it was listed for $1.3 million. Brian Milton

Restaurants layoffs piling up since dining shutdown

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 11:30 AM PST

When Gov. Andrew Cuomo shut down indoor dining again, restaurants started handing out pink slips. Again. At least five restaurants have filed WARN notices with the Department of Labor in recent days, citing the governor’s restrictions as the reason they are laying off staff. Three of those — Electric Lemon, Upland NYC and El Vez NY — are owned by STARR Restaurants. In total, they are laying off 117 employees. Le Bernardin and Aldo Sohm

How landlords get around the commercial eviction moratorium

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 11:00 AM PST

New York has been under an eviction moratorium for nearly nine months — and there’s no end in sight. For tenants struggling to keep up with rent, that’s good news. For landlords … no. Though some commercial property owners are finding ways to boot delinquent tenants, others are working out payment plans or profit-sharing agreements with restaurants and retailers. Residential is a different story altogether. Landlord attorney Adam Leitman Bailey explains it all in the

New home sales slide but prices are rising

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 10:15 AM PST

New home sales dropped across the U.S. again last month, while prices continued to rise. There were 841,000 newly-built single-family homes sold in November, seasonally adjusted, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s monthly report. That’s down 11 percent from the 945,000 sales in October. The Census Bureau’s report counts sales at the time contracts are signed, not closed, which makes the report a leading indicator of future transactions. November was the third consecutive month that

1 of every 7 chain stores closed NYC locations this year

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 09:35 AM PST

It’s not just small businesses and mom-and-pops that are hurting in 2020: Chain stores are also shuttering at a rapid rate across New York City. More than 1,000 chain stores across New York City — nearly one out of every seven that were open this time last year — have closed their doors over the past 12 months, according to a new report by the Center for an Urban Future, a think tank focused on

Judge overturns contested Franklin Avenue rezoning

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 08:46 AM PST

After years of legal wrangling, a Brooklyn judge struck down a contested Crown Heights rezoning on Monday. Kings County Supreme Court Judge Reginald A. Boddie reversed the certification for the 2018 Franklin Avenue rezoning, siding with activists who alleged that the city did not conduct a thorough environmental review before it was approved, Brooklyn Paper reported. Developer Cornell Realty sought the zoning change in order to build two 16-story buildings at 40 Crown Street and

Buttigieg hints at ripping up urban highways

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 08:15 AM PST

U.S. Department of Transportation nominee Pete Buttigieg has urban highways in his crosshairs. The mayor of South Bend and former presidential candidate proposed changing federal policy that encouraged highways to cut through minority communities and have depressed property values ever since, Streetsblog reported. “It’s disproportionately Black and brown neighborhoods that were divided by highway projects plowing through them because they didn’t have the political capital to resist,” Buttigieg told CNN’s Jake Tapper on Sunday. “We

Toxic talk: Agents’ use of Parler app stirs concerns

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 07:30 AM PST

A few weeks after the election, Steve Martin Smith, a Florida-based RE/MAX broker, used his public Parler account to amplify a post by the far-right extremist group Proud Boys. The all-male, self-described “chauvinist” organization was promoting a march for President Donald Trump in Washington, D.C. Thousands attended the Dec. 12 event, including anti-Trump protesters, and the demonstration devolved into violence. Four stabbings were reported in connection with the march, and Proud Boys chairman Enrique Tarrio

Beny Steinmetz sentenced to five years in bribery scandal

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 06:46 AM PST

Romania’s Supreme Court has handed down a five-year sentence to billionaire Beny Steinmetz, a reported silent backer of New York real estate. The decision overturns a lower court’s June 2019 decision to acquit Steinmetz and partner Tal Silberstein, a media consultant. The higher court ruled that the pair collaborated with a Romanian businessman and the grandson of the country’s former king in an attempt to defraud the state, Haaretz first reported. Steinmetz, who has an

All Year Management in default on $170 million Brooklyn mortgage

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 06:15 AM PST

All Year Management is in some new trouble. The company’s prime rental property is already scheduled for a Uniform Commercial Code foreclosure sale in February. Now, All Year is also in default on its $170 million mortgage, according to the Commercial Observer. The second phase of the 750-unit rental complex, named Denizen Bushwick, faces foreclosure on the mezzanine interest because All Year, led by Yoel Goldman, failed to make payments on a $65 million mezzanine

The life and times of Kurt Rappaport, California’s alpha agent

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 05:45 AM PST

“It’s 10:30 at night, and I’m in a restaurant. My phone is ringing, no caller ID. I answer the call. It’s Larry Ellison.” Eighteen years on, Kurt Rappaport said he still recalls exactly how the phone call that changed his life went down. He continued: “[Ellison] says, ‘I’m flying in tomorrow. I’ll land in Santa Monica around 10:00 a.m. I’d like to be on Carbon Beach. My friend, David Geffen, lives on Carbon Beach. If

Brookfield, All Year highlight big week for mid-market sales

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 05:00 AM PST

The uptick in middle-market investment sales activity in the city continued last week. Six deals involving industrial and residential buildings tallied $98.9 million. It was the third week in a row that more than $97 million in transactions were recorded across the five boroughs. The deals are all between $10 million and $30 million each. On the list last week was Brookfield Property Partners, which bought in the Bronx. Facing financial woes, All Year Management

Mortgage applications fall as home prices soar

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 04:44 AM PST

Soaring home prices are now discouraging buyers more than low rates are motivating them. An index tracking applications for mortgages to buy homes dropped 5 percent last week, seasonally adjusted, compared to the prior week, the Mortgage Bankers Association reported. It’s the second time in three weeks that the metric, known as the purchase index, has dropped. Joel Kan, MBA’s head of industry forecasting, attributed the recent slowdown in purchase applications to rising home prices

South Florida home sales soar in November, led by luxury properties

Posted: 23 Dec 2020 04:30 AM PST

Residential sales surged for a third straight month throughout South Florida, with luxury sales leading the charge. Total home sales across the region reached nearly $4.3 billion in November, according to the Miami Association of Realtors. Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties all experienced double-digit jumps in sales, year-over-year, just as they did in October and September. Sales dollar volume of single-family homes also soared in November, spiking by more than 50 percent in each