The Real Deal - New York Real Estate News

Die another day: Ashford gets $350M to survive pandemic

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 03:50 PM PST

The price is high, but one of the nation’s largest hotel investment trusts will live to be hospitable another day. Ashford Hospitality Trust secured a $350 million loan facility to see it through the pandemic, which has decimated the travel and leisure industry. It will pay 16 percent interest in the first two years and 14 percent in the third, plus exit fees that could bring the total payback cost to nearly $600 million. With

Kushner Companies plans $100M Israeli bond raise

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 03:29 PM PST

As a senior advisor in the Trump White House, Jared Kushner played a lead role in implementing the outgoing administration’s Middle East policy. And now, Kushner’s family firm is heading to the region to raise money. Kushner Companies has filed papers to raise $100 million through a bond issuance on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange, the Wall Street Journal reported. “Kushner is considering the option of issuing bonds on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange,” a

City identifies cause of fatal wall collapse in Brooklyn

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 02:48 PM PST

City officials say inadequate support for a retaining wall led to the death of a construction worker in a Brooklyn yard on Monday. Jashim Mia, 39, was killed on Tuesday when a retaining wall collapsed at 454 42nd Street in Sunset Park, according to the New York City Police Department and Department of Buildings. He was hired to repair the retaining wall, and was performing excavation work along the length of the structure. Inadequate shoring

South Florida’s juiciest real estate lawsuits of 2020

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 02:30 PM PST

The pandemic did not stop top real estate players from seeking relief through the courts or from becoming legal targets, themselves. So, there was no shortage of juicy lawsuits featuring the top names in the industry. Here are the top 10 lawsuits reported by The Real Deal in 2020: Bal Harbour Shops vs. Saks Fifth Avenue The economic fallout of the pandemic is endangering one of the longest running tenant-landlord relationships in luxury retail. In

City plans to suspend senior housing program

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 01:54 PM PST

The city is pulling the plug on a senior housing program over concerns that it violates fair housing laws. The Department of Housing Preservation and Development told developers this month that it plans to stop accepting applications for its Privately Financed Affordable Senior Housing program, known by its acronym PFASH. The program allows developers to increase the scale of a project that sets aside a certain percentage of units as affordable independent residences for seniors,

Mid-market sales slow in final weeks of the year

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 01:25 PM PST

Activity for New York’s mid-market investment sales — that is, sales between $10 million and $30 million — unsurprisingly slowed in the weeks before the end of the year. There were just five sales totaling $58.05 million, with every borough except Staten Island represented. The largest parcel sold was a 4,900-square-foot industrial building in Borough Park, which will eventually transform into a commercial space. Other deals include affordable housing in the Bronx and a development

Bushwick retrofit project provides blueprint for greening buildings

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 12:45 PM PST

New York City’s sustainability goals for the next decade are ambitious: The Climate Mobilization Act of 2019 mandates that the city must cut its greenhouse gas emissions by 40 percent by 2030. And a good chunk of that must come from buildings, which contribute close to 70 percent of the city’s total carbon output. Landlords have been fretting over how to make their buildings more green since the legislation passed last year, but a new

City extends little-used storefronts program through September

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 12:00 PM PST

The Open Storefronts program, which allows stores to sell goods on the sidewalk in front of their location, has been extended by nine months. The initiative, which had been set to end Dec. 31, will now run through Sept. 30, according to an executive order signed by Mayor Bill de Blasio, 6sqft reported. The program will also be expanded to increase the number of restaurants and retail stores that can use sidewalks. “We think that’s

Home prices hit fastest growth in six years

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 11:15 AM PST

Home prices continued to surge in October, new data show. Prices were up 8.4 percent year-over-year, according to the S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller index tracking the housing market in major metropolitan areas. Their 12-month gain in September was 6.6 percent. “The last time that the National Composite matched this month’s 8.4 percent growth rate was more than six and a half years ago, in March 2014,” Craig J. Lazzara, managing director and Global Head of Index

Simon completes acquisition of high-end mall owner Taubman

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 10:15 AM PST

After a tumultuous process, Simon Property Group has completed its acquisition of Taubman Realty Group. Under the merger agreement, which was made official Tuesday, Simon acquired an 80 percent ownership stake in the company. The Taubman family sold off about a third of its ownership interest, but will retain a 20 percent stake in the company. “We are very pleased to complete this transaction and to add some of the world’s premier retail assets to

Jonathan Rose nabs Bronx apartment project for $64M

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 09:45 AM PST

Jonathan Rose Companies has purchased an affordable housing apartment building in the Bronx for $64 million, just weeks after closing a massive “impact acquisition” fund. The New Rochelle–based firm bought the 190-unit building at 350 St. Ann’s Avenue from Omni New York, records show. Jonathan Rose Companies secured a $53 million mortgage from Merchants Capital to acquire the property. The property was last purchased in 2004 for $15.5 million, according to PropertyShark. Jonathan Rose Companies

Some of Isaac Kassirer’s Harlem buildings head to bankruptcy

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 08:30 AM PST

Isaac Kassirer, the prolific multifamily investor who went on a tear acquiring thousands of rent-regulated properties throughout Manhattan and the Bronx before the rent law changed, is on the verge of losing a big chunk of his portfolio. The debtors of more than a dozen buildings owned by Kassirer’s Emerald Equity Group, located on or around West 107th Street and East 117th Street in Harlem, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, PincusCo reported. The petition asks

Brooklyn medical buildings sell for $40M

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 07:45 AM PST

A set of three medical buildings in Bay Ridge recently traded hands for more than $40 million, in what was reportedly a 1031 exchange transaction. The three buildings, totaling about 61,400 square feet, are located at 7601 Fourth Avenue, 9020 Fifth Avenue, and 7115-21 13th Avenue and are fully occupied by medical tenants such as ProHealth, Quest Diagnostics, and ENT & Allergy Associates, according to marketing materials reviewed by The Real Deal. The buyer was

Covid-19 vaccine won’t be immediate cure for office market

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 07:05 AM PST

It’s been a rough year for the office market — and it’s unlikely that the first half of next year will be much better. Even though Covid-19 vaccines are being distributed across the country, public health and real estate experts believe that a return to the office likely will not happen until late spring or early summer, the Wall Street Journal reports. Experts say that it will take months for the vaccine rollout to become

De Blasio’s Crown Heights flip-flop was no Garden-variety reversal

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 06:15 AM PST

When Mayor Bill de Blasio publicly rejected a Crown Heights residential project that would cast shadows over the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, jaws dropped in real estate circles. Never before had the mayor openly opposed a rezoning pending before the City Council. And never had he prioritized neighborhood character over affordable housing. Real estate was already looking at 12 more months of toothlessness from an allegedly pro-development mayor. Now, it appears that he’s trying to grow

Condos, conspiracies and coronavirus: 2020’s juiciest lawsuits

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 05:30 AM PST

An unprecedented pandemic and economic downturn made 2020 a big year for real estate lawsuits. Sometimes, coronavirus was just one more complicating factor in an already difficult situation — be it softness in New York’s condo market, long-standing headwinds in the retail sector or business relationships gone sour. In other cases, the pandemic was the main cause for a legal confrontation. Still, some lawsuits were the kind you would expect the city’s high-stakes real estate

NYC’s biggest 5 portfolio deals of 2020

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 05:00 AM PST

The list of 2020’s biggest portfolio deals in New York showed some diversity. The top 5 deals, comprising warehouses, shopping centers, multifamily and even film studios, totaled about $1 billion worth of sales. The tally was roughly 38 percent off from last year’s figure of $1.6 billion — which itself was half the total from the previous year. Here are the five largest portfolio sales of 2020: 1. Silvercup Studios | $482M Buyer: Hackman Capital,

Rising UCC foreclosures are “the tip of the iceberg”

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 04:30 AM PST

Churchill Real Estate’s Justin Ehrlich has seen a lot during his time as a developer and lender in New York. He witnessed the collapse of the real estate market during the 2008 financial crisis, followed by the mad rush to build luxury condo towers in some of Manhattan’s swankiest neighborhoods. But nothing compares to the past nine months, he said. “It’s not normal,” Ehrlich noted. “It’s the worst I’ve ever seen.” He pointed to an

These are NYC’s largest rental landlords of 2020

Posted: 29 Dec 2020 04:00 AM PST

While 2020 was a turbulent year for New York City, things have largely stayed the same for the city’s biggest rental landlords. Policy changes in 2019 left New York’s multifamily players reeling, but the rental apartment sector experienced remarkably little distress compared to other sectors, like office or retail — something that industry experts had predicted at the start of the pandemic. “Read my lips: You are not going to see distress in multifamily,” Lightstone