Commercial Breaks
No Spin Zone! Brokers Brutal on Commercial Market's '08 Turn
The commercial real estate market must really be wretched. How else to explain Cushman & Wakefield’s midyear breakfast on Tuesday morning when, in Michael’s glassed-in patio, a couple of ballsy brokers erupted with skepticism, calling into question their bosses’ own stats—to those bosses’ faces. In front of the press.
“If I were sitting in the media looking at the stats, I’d think that someone was drinking the Kool-Aid,” said Joshua Kuriloff, a broker at the firm.
Mr. Kuriloff even uttered the R-word (“recession”) to describe the economy—a term that’s verboten among most real estate types, who favor limper nouns like “contraction,” “slowdown” and “downturn.
The Lab
The High-End End?
Luxury apartment prices dropped in Manhattan in the second quarter of 2008, and sales were down in the first six months of the year compared to the two six-month periods immediately before. The end of an era in Manhattan luxury?
Not bloody likely. There are at least four apartments on the market in 15 Central Park West for $80 million or more, according to various sources and scuttlebutt, including one “quietly” asking $150 million (the city’s biggest listing ever), according to Douglas Elliman mega-broker Dolly Lenz. That’s just one example of the particularly heated luxury market that has seemed all these years, even during the hottest times of the hottest housing market, rather rarefied and detached.
The Sit-Down
Beveridge Fizzy On Future
Location: The theme that unites the Mayor’s 2030 PlaNYC is that the city will grow by about one million people in the next 25 years. Do you agree?
Mr. Beveridge: It’s an interesting thing because the way they framed it was that it’s inevitable that the city’s going to grow that much. … If you take a look at it, that isn’t that much growth, percentage-wise, since they have it over 30 years.
So what happens in 20 years? How big is the city?
It will be bigger. Unless something bad happens! Then it will be smaller.
Tales of Retail
Meatpacking Cooked?
Joanne Lucas shocked the New York restaurant world last week with an extraordinary announcement.
After months of searching for some deep-pocketed tenant to replace the hugely celebrated restaurateur Florent Morellet, whom she infamously booted from her building at 69 Gansevoort Street amid a lengthy dispute over rent and taxes, Ms. Lucas had finally decided to leave well enough alone.
She would reopen Mr. Morellet’s famous Florent restaurant on her own, less than 48 hours after its highly publicized June 29 closure. Same menu. Same staff. Same iconic green storefront. Only without the eccentric Mr. Morellet at the helm. Or his neon pink “Florent” sign in the window.
Manhattan Transfers
De Montebello Sells East Side Co-op for $2.1 M., But Stays in Met's Neighborhood
The fact that imperial Metropolitan Museum of Art director Philippe de Montebello is ending his 31-year tenure in just a few months is bad enough for the Upper East Side’s delicate collective psyche. But what would happen to the neighborhood’s sense of nobility if the molasses-voiced descendent of Napoleonic aristocracy (and, on his mother’s side, of the Marquis de Sade) actually moved away?
According to city records, Mr. de Montebello and his wife, Edith, director of financial aid at the Trinity School, sold their two-bedroom co-op at 25 East 86th Street this month for $2.195 million.
The buyer is graphic designer Holly Okner, whose father happens to be the investor Peter A.
Real Estate
The Real Estate On Holiday
The Real Estate will be posting sporadically from Wednesday, July 2, through Tuesday, July 8. We're back in full July 9. Happy Fourth!
The Afternoon Wrap: Tuesday
The overbudget WTC redevelopment plan has its first casualty. The wings enclosing the vast concourse of Santiago Calatrava’s transit terminal (rendering above) will now be non-retractable. [City Room]
Alternate-side parking regulations will soon be suspended in Gowanus, Boerum Hill, and Carroll Gardens. Park Slope residents smile in smug satisfaction. [Curbed]
Times Square’s new Premier Hotel has a woman’s-only floor, and there’s a yoga mat for every room! [HotelChatter]
Keith McNally – the hot restaurateur currently spicing up Minetta Tavern – heads to the rapidly gentrifying Bowery. [Eater]
A construction worker in love with an Upper West Side woman does what any sensible man of his trade would do: he repels into her 10th-floor apartment. read more »
Carlyle Group Buys Stake in 666 Fifth's Retail for $525 M.
The Carlyle Group closed today on the purchase of an interest in the retail condo at 666 Fifth Avenue, the tower that Kushner Companies bought last year for a then-record $1.8 billion, according to a source familiar with the deal.
Carlyle Group -– the mammoth private equity group that manages $82.7 billion in 60 funds worldwide and recently, with Ashkenazy Acquisition Corp., bought 650 Madison Avenue for $680 million -- is purchasing this deal in partnership with Stanley Chera's Crown Acquisitions. The 49 percent stake, as reported by Bloomberg News, in the approximately 90,000-square-foot retail portion, which includes a Brooks Brothers and the NBA Store, is valued in the deal at $525 million. read more »
Harry Winston Sells Flagship Store to Paramount For $62 M.
Ronald Winston, son of the founder of the eponymous Harry Winston jewelers, has sold the firm's flagship building at 718 Fifth Avenue for $62 million, according to city records.
Paramount Group, which made the purchase, is apparently on a shopping spree that would make even Harry proud. Albert Behler's Paramount is apparently snapping up 1301 Avenue of the Americas, the Credit Lyonnais Building, for a staggering $1.5 billion.
Neither Paramount Group's spokeswoman nor the spokesperson for Harry Winston could be reached for comment.
After Willets Point Community Vote, Landowners Claim Victory Too
Following last night's late-night Queens Community Board 7 conditional endorsement of the city's redevelopment plan for Willets Point, the landowner and business group opposing the redevelopment there is hailing the vote as a victory.
The margin of support, the group noted, was closer than it was just a week ago when a community board committee voted on the plan (20-15, compared with 22-3 a week ago), also noting that the conditions placed on the endorsement are rather restrictive.
Release below.
Willets Point Business Owners Declare Victory at Community Board Vote
Conditions Placed on EDC Plan Demonstrate Distrust of City
(New York, NY) July 1, 2008 -The Willets Point business owners fighting to protect their private property from an unprecedented and potentially illegal land grab by the Bloomberg Administration declared victory in the latest skirmish with the City, noting that opposition from members of Community Board 7 increased dramatically at Monday's vote while those board members who approved the plan imposed such severe conditions that the vote was tantamount to a rejection of the Economic Development Corporation plan. read more »
Lady Selling $47.5 M. Co-op: 'What Difference Does It Make To Me? None! Zero!'
In tomorrow's Manhattan Transfers, I write about a seven-bedroom duplex (actually, a "gym/bedroom" makes it eight) that went on the market this month at 1030 Fifth Avenue for $47.5 million, one of the biggest apartment listings ever in New York.
(See Vespa-driving broker Sharon Baum's listing for good floor plans, or certified Lamaze instructor Fritzi Kallop's listing for the good interior shots.)
The sellers are an orthopedic surgeon named Dr. David Fleiss, and his wife, Karen, a Barnard trustee who founded the hedge fund KMF Partners. (If you're into this sort of thing, you may also remember Ms. Fleiss from an apartment deal with Brown Bunny director Vincent Gallo. read more »
Tumble! Manhattan Investment Sales Plunge In '08
Over $13.8 billion in Manhattan investment sales closed or went under contract in the first six months of 2008, a precipitous drop from the $34 billion in sales volume done in the first six months last year. Nearly half of this 2008 volume came via foreign investors.
The numbers come from brokerage Cushman & Wakefield's latest quarterly Manhattan market report, released this morning during a breakfast at Midtown power eatery Michael's.
The dismal investment sales numbers--which cover building, property and portfolio sales--aren't a surprise, really. Nor is the increase in the amount of foreign investment (it accounted for maybe 12 to 15 percent of investment sales in previous six-month periods). read more »
Some Starbucks Devotees Spurn Pike Place Blend
OoooooK. A backlash has apparently bubbled forth against Starbucks' new Pike Place Roast, a smoother blend that the coffee giant unveiled in April. The Wall Street Journal this morning reports that regular Starbucks addicts are the ones none too pleased with the blend and they're taking to the blogs!
Much of that debate is taking place on the company's customer-feedback Web site, which the chain launched in March. The site is littered with thumbs-down verdicts on the new roast. ...
A customer with the handle Westend complained in a posting on the site that the flavor of Pike Place Roast is "weak, watery and no substitute for the bold." Another, ArtM, called the coffee "a fundamental, grievous error." Beccajav derided its finish as "reminiscent of a taste from the dentist's office."
Brooklyn, The Borough: Ikea's Benevolent Despotism
On a recent warm summer evening, two young professional couples sat idly chatting before a performance of Hamlet at Central Park's Delacorte Theater.
"Have you been to the new Ikea in Red Hook?" one of the young men asked his companions, receiving a chorus of "no, not yet!" in response.
On came a list of household items wanted, but not necessarily needed. "I was a bit worried about getting everything home on the ferry," one young lady said.
"I can help you," said her male companion.
With the opening of Ikea Brooklyn on June 18, no longer is a trip to Elizabeth, N. read more »
Bloomberg Wins Early Community Endorsement For Willets Point
The local community board in Queens has endorsed the Bloomberg administration’s plans to redevelop Willets Point, the industrial 61-acre site by Shea Stadium, according to a late-night release from the Bloomberg administration. The vote comes despite opposition from the local City Council members, housing advocacy groups and property owners.
We don’t yet have key details—such as the margin of the vote or the conditions attached to the endorsement—but the city sent out an announcement hailing the vote a bit before 1 a.m.
Such community board endorsements are rather uncommon early in the process of contentious rezonings, as the boards usually vote against the developments with a set of conditions they want to see satisfied. read more »
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