The Real Deal - New York Real Estate News

Brooklyn luxury contracts dip in first week of 2021

Posted: 11 Jan 2021 04:00 PM PST

New year, new trend? For the first time in months, more condos went into contract in Brooklyn than townhouses, according to Compass’ weekly report tracking properties asking $2 million or more. There were 15 luxury deals inked last week in the borough — 10 condos and five townhouses — for a total sales volume of $37.6 million. That’s a big change from the previous week’s 21 deals totaling $70 million. The median asking price for

Compass files confidentially for IPO

Posted: 11 Jan 2021 03:25 PM PST

Compass has filed confidentially to go public. The residential brokerage, which has raised $1.5 billion from investors including SoftBank, said it submitted a draft registration statement with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Monday. Compass did not disclose the size of the offering. The firm’s last valuation was $6.4 billion in July 2019, when it raised a $370 million Series G. The impending IPO has been the subject of intense speculation in the real

No “causal link” between rezonings and gentrification

Posted: 11 Jan 2021 03:21 PM PST

The debate at a City Council hearing on Monday largely revolved around a single question: Do New York City’s rezonings cause displacement? According to the de Blasio administration, the answer is no. “We maintain that we can’t find any causal link between our rezonings and gentrification,” said Anita Laremont, the executive director of the Department of City Planning. The hearing, held by the Council’s land use committee, focused on a bill that would require certain

National Association of Realtors among biggest donors to “sedition caucus”

Posted: 11 Jan 2021 02:15 PM PST

Big banks and major corporations are rethinking their political donations in the wake of last week’s violence in Washington — a decision the real estate industry must now confront. According to OpenSecrets.org, which is affiliated with the nonprofit Center for Responsive Politics, the industry is among the largest donors to the members of Congress who contested President-elect Joe Biden’s Electoral College win last week. All told, the real estate industry donated over $16.3 million to

David Cassidy’s former Fort Lauderdale home sells

Posted: 11 Jan 2021 01:10 PM PST

A Los Angeles real estate investor who once hung David Cassidy’s poster on her bedroom wall acquired the late actor’s Fort Lauderdale home. Cassidy, who rose to fame during his tenure on the 1970s show “The Partridge Family,” gave up his assets – including his Fort Lauderdale home – as part of a Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing during his divorce with wife Susan Shifrin. The couple paid $1.1 million for the property in 2001, and

From lender with love: Bond-themed hotel sued for $40M

Posted: 11 Jan 2021 12:15 PM PST

It’s a view to a bill: A lawsuit says a Midtown hotel with a James Bond-themed bar owes $40 million. Cindy Zhang, a non-secret agent for the lender, alleged in a complaint filed Jan. 9 that Abraham Noy, owner of the 297-key Aliz Hotel at 310 West 40th Street in Midtown, defaulted on a loan that came due in November. Noy developed the hotel in 2014. In 2018 YJR Group inked a lease for the

Cuomo pushes for commercial-to-resi conversions

Posted: 11 Jan 2021 11:31 AM PST

Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Monday called for the conversion of vacant commercial space into affordable and supportive housing. During his 11th State of the State address, Cuomo cited the spike in empty commercial space as an opportunity to add dwellings. Such a proposal has already been promoted by the real estate industry: Last month the Real Estate Board of New York identified 210 million square feet of class B and C office space citywide that

Upper East Side trophy property tops luxury deals — again

Posted: 11 Jan 2021 11:30 AM PST

An Upper East Side resident who jotted down the number of a developer after seeing it posted at a construction site has brokered the biggest luxury deal last week in Manhattan. The unnamed buyer and soon-to-be owner of a penthouse at 109 East 79th Street negotiated the deal directly with Cathy Franklin at Corcoran Group, who is handling on-site sales, according to the latest market report from Olshan Realty. The unit was last asking $32.5

70 restaurants sue Cuomo over “Kafkaesque nightmare” of regulations

Posted: 11 Jan 2021 10:36 AM PST

Our Wicked Lady, which describes itself as a “bar for Brooklyn’s artist community,” has spent $10,000 retrofitting its business to comply with social distancing mandates since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic. The venue has kept its rooftop bar open for service, with masks and reservations required for patrons. It’s even launched a GoFundMe to try and stay in business. Even so, the Bushwick venue has lost $445,000 in revenue since Mar. 15, around when

Apartments, hotel to be added to Moorestown Mall

Posted: 11 Jan 2021 09:00 AM PST

Consumers will soon be about to shop for housing at Moorestown Mall — literally, housing at the mall. The mall’s owner, Pennsylvania REIT, announced that it received approval to add up to 1,065 multifamily units and a hotel at Moorestown Mall in New Jersey. It envisions mall residents and hotel visitors shopping there, too. “The synergistic addition of apartments and hotels will benefit our existing tenants and communities by increasing visits to the property and

Chelsea Hotel reno can resume after housing department drops fight

Posted: 11 Jan 2021 08:30 AM PST

The city’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development has dropped its fight against the owner of Chelsea Hotel, allowing a long-planned renovation of the legendary hotel to move forward. The housing agency reached the decision because of a 1997 document recently found in city archives, The City reported. The document was brought to the agency’s attention by a consultant working for BD Hotels, the firm headed by Richard Born and Ira Drukier that bought a

Hell’s Kitchen bar owner wants to sell for Bitcoin

Posted: 11 Jan 2021 07:15 AM PST

A New York bar owner wants to sell his two Hell’s Kitchen establishments — for Bitcoin. Patrick Hughes owns two bars — Hellcat Annie’s and Scruffy Duffy’s — that sit next to each other on 10th Avenue near 45th Street. He recently put those watering holes up for sale for 25 Bitcoins or 800 Ethereum tokens, which translates to about $875,000, the New York Post reported. “I’m hoping to catch one of these crypto dudes

New High Line section will connect to Moynihan Train Hall

Posted: 11 Jan 2021 06:45 AM PST

Another phase of the High Line is coming. The elevated park, which runs along Manhattan’s Far West Side and through the Hudson Yards megaproject, will be expanded to connect the newly opened Moynihan Train Hall, the New York Times reported. The new 1,200-foot pathway will link the final section of the High Line at West 30th Street and 10th Avenue to a pedestrian walkway at the Manhattan West megaproject, developed by Brookfield Properties, which abuts

Banks join Marriott in halting political contributions after Capitol riot

Posted: 11 Jan 2021 06:35 AM PST

In the wake of last week’s violence at the U.S. Capitol Building, corporations are thinking twice about funneling money to political candidates. Marriott International was the first big company to announce it would cut off campaign contributions to politicians who did not vote to certify President-elect Joe Biden’s win in the presidential election, as was first reported by the newsletter Popular Information. The hotel chain had previously donated a total of $2,000 to entities associated

Who made bank in Opendoor’s IPO? $100M for a visitor logbook firm Inbox

Posted: 11 Jan 2021 04:00 AM PST

The big winners of Opendoor’s IPO Opendoor’s IPO last month crowned CEO Eric Wu a billionaire. It quintupled the value of SoftBank’s stake to $2.3 billion. And it reaped early investor Khosla Ventures a 36x return — on paper. After merging with a blank-check company last month, the iBuyer’s stock closed at $31.25 per share on its next day of trading, Dec. 21, giving it a market capitalization of close to $19 billion. (The stock closed