commercial observer - rebny special issue full

POWER BROKERSwig’s Todd Korren

On Downtown

DATA GALORE!Top Financing,

Refi Deals of 4Q

LEASE BEAT40 West 53rd Street

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January 19, 2010 THE WEEKLY NEWSPAPER OF NEW YORK’S COMMERCIAL REAL ESTATE INDUSTRY $5.00

Mary Ann Tighe Becomes First Woman to Chair REBNY—

Now, to Business! BY JOTHAM SEDERSTROM

PLUS More on the 2010 REBNY Honorees

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observer.com | the commercial observer2 January 19, 2010

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10 Prospective TenantsBy Dana Rubinstein

L.A. law firm Winston & Strawn hires Studley for massive o!ce hunt.

12 Commercial BreaksBy Dana Rubinstein2009’s biggest uptown commercial deal is a port-folio sale. Déjà vu?

14 Lease BeatBy Emily Geminder77 Water Street111 Eighth Avenue512 BroadwayAnd dozens more of New York’s latest commercial leases.

22 The Lead IndicatorBy Sam ChandanBanks in New York and London brace for govern-ment gobbling.

24 The Op-Ed: REBNY Award WinnersSandy Lindenbaum, Robert Knakal, Ralph J. DiRuggiero and David Greenbaum among this year’s honorees.

26 Concrete Thoughts By Robert KnakalA thank-you note for an honoree’s career.

28 The Sit-DownBy Jotham SederstromREBNY’s new chair, Mary Ann Tighe, on her pri-orities for the board this year.

30 The Power Broker: Todd KorrenBy Jotham SederstromThe Swiq Equities leasing ace and REBNY honoree talks downtown potential.

32 Building Stories: 77 Water StreetBy Emily GeminderHow Goldman Sachs made a tower disappear.

34 Top 4Q FinancingCompiled by Roland Li with data from PropertyShark.comThe top 15 financings and refinancings in the last three months of 2009.

42 CMBS CornerDesigned by Nigel Holmes with data from TREPP, LLCThe top loans by submar-ket maturing in 2010.

46 CalendarBy Jotham SederstromThe week ahead in events.

IN THIS WEEK’S ISSUE Vol. 2, No. 3

30

the commercial observer | observer.com January 19, 2010 3

JAMES D. [email protected]

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The Commercial Observer is published 49 times per year by Observer Media Group, 915 Broadway, New York, NY 10010. All Rights Re-served. Material from this publication may not be reproduced without written permission from the publisher. For advertising infor-mation, call 212-407-9382. One-year subscription, $245, two-year subscription, $345. For subscriptions, call 212-407-9331.

Jared Kushner, PublisherRobyn Weiss, Associate Publisher

Kyle Pope, Editorial DirectorTom Acitelli, Editor

Eliot Brown, Dana Rubinstein, Staff Writers Robert Knakal, Sam Chandan, Columnists Jotham Sederstrom, Emily Geminder, Contributing Writers

Nancy Butkus, Art DirectorTyler Rush, Production ManagerChris Cronis, Copy EditorPeter Lettre, Photo EditorBarbara Sullivan, Design AssociateLisa Medchill, Advertising Production

Christopher Barnes, President, Observer Media GroupBarry Lewis, Exec. Vice President, Observer Media GroupBrian Cohen, General CounselSteve Goldberg, Senior Vice President SalesKen Newman, Director of Classified Advertising

THE WEEK IN REAL ESTATE January 12-19

Cushman & Wakefield’s Harbert: The End of the Slump Is Nigh

First things first: Check out our awesome new o!ces!So began real estate brokerage Cushman & Wakefield’s

fourth-quarter breakfast on Tuesday, Jan. 12, which, in a marked break from tradition, took place in Cushman’s spi"y new o!ces on the seventh floor of Vornado’s 1290 Avenue of the Americas, rather than at Michael’s midtown eatery, where it has been for time immemorial. (Whether this was an austerity measure or a sincere attempt to show o" the firm’s new o!ces is anybody’s guess.)

In another marked break from tradition, instead of milky scrambled eggs and a sparse picking of fruit à la Michael’s, the breakfast featured little triangular-shaped stacks of French toast, granola and yogurt, and a huge bowl overflowing with ripe berries, served by handsome waiters from Thomas Preti Caterers.

All of which served as an enticing distraction from the meat of the presentation: New York’s commercial real estate market.

“This time, New York seems to be leading the way out of the recession,” said New York region COO Joseph Harbert (pictured), contrasting this meltdown to former recessions, in which New York’s recovery trailed that of the nation as a whole.

Mr. Harbert backed up his claim with the fact that New York has lost far, far fewer jobs than originally predicted—about 147,000, rather than, say, 300,000—something he at-tributed in part to federal assistance in the form of TARP funds. That, in turn, means that New York has lost fewer o!ce-using jobs than expected—6.7 percent from the peak, as compared to 7 percent nationwide.

All that said, new leasing activity—a number that excludes plain old renewals—was far from impressive. In 2009, Manhattan saw 16.3 million square feet of new leases. Compare that to 2008 (19.1 million square feet), 2007 (23.6 million square feet) and 2006 (27.1 mil-lion). Even worse, compare that to the last recession, in 2001, a year that saw 18.9 million square feet in new leases.

More bad indicators?“This is the most negative slide you will see,” said Mr. Harbert, referring to a bar graph

titled “Comparative Direct Net Absorption.” He pointed to a long, green bar dipping inches below the X axis. Its meaning? In 2009, negative absorption totaled 11.6 million square feet, which brought the Manhattan vacancy rate to 11.1 percent. That negative absorption, said Mr. Harbert, equaled the negative absorption of the past 13 years combined. Even worse, one downtown broker predicted the vacancy rate there would soar to 15.75 percent.

And investment sales? Don’t ask. Last year, the trading of buildings was, essentially, “nonexistent,” said Mr. Harbert. Though investment sales broker Jon Caplan reassured the room that “[t]here is a wave of capital coming to the U.S. from all over the world,” and that “New York is the No. 1 target market.”

Now for the good news. When you include renewal activity, with tenants extend-ing their current leases rather than relocating, 2009 saw 35 deals of more than 100,000 square feet in size. In 2008, there were only 32; in 2007, only 30.

Mr. Harbert also showed a slide depicting midtown leasing activity by quarter over recent years, and said the bars depicted something of an “inverted salad bowl.” Not a V, which would be ideal. But way better than, say, a flat line, or a downward sloping line with no end in sight.

Also on the upside! Retail is doing comparatively well, what with recent big transac-tions in Times Square (Disney) and Sixth Avenue (Trader Joe’s). According to retail bro-ker Brad Mendelson, that’s because New York, for all its peccadilloes, remains the United States’ tourist mecca.

—Dana Rubinstein

BY ROLAND LI

A Burst of Sunshine! Broker Suzanne Sunshine has been award-

ed 95,000 square feet in new nonprofit assign-ments. She is representing Year Up New York City, which is looking to move from 55 Ex-change Place to 20,000 square feet in down-town. She is also representing the Atlantic Philanthropies, which is looking to sublease 25,000 square feet in 125 Park Avenue, and Council for Senior Centers and Services of New York, looking to relocate from 49 West 45th Street to 4,000 square feet around Penn Station. Ms. Sunshine is also representing a so-

cial service nonprofit looking to lease 20,000 square feet downtown and a museum looking to buy 25,000 square feet in the Plaza district.

Families Settle Up at 515 Madison

Two families represented by brokerage Studley have sold a majority interest in 515 Madison Avenue. The Malloy and She"er fam-ilies sold the interest of their fee and senior leasehold positions to a joint venture led by the Gural and Hemmerdinger families, which controlled the existing subordinate leaseholds.

The transaction values the 340,000-square-foot building at $150 million, or approximately $440 per square foot, and was financed with a loan from Wells Fargo.

U.S. Vacancy Rates Rise in 4Q

The rises in nationwide vacancy rates slowed in the o!ce, industrial and retail mar-kets during the fourth quarter of 2009, accord-ing to CB Richard Ellis. O!ce vacancy rates in-creased nationwide by 20 basis points to 16.3 percent on average. Industrial availability rate increased 40 basis points to 13.9 percent. Re-tail availability increased 20 basis points to 12.5 percent. The rise in vacancy rates for mul-tifamily properties remained steady.

Anne Frank Center Looking Real estate firm Grubb & Ellis is representing

the Anne Frank Center USA, a nonprofit that is seeking to relocate from 38 Crosby Street. The center is seeking to lease approximately 3,000 square feet for an exhibit and o!ce space on a ground floor, second floor or combination of the two. Grubb & Ellis’ Robert Shapiro, executive managing director, and Gerald Gibian, manag-ing director, are representing the center.

Big Aéropostale Lease in 1515 BroadwayClothing retailer Aéropostale is expected to lease a 17,000-square-foot storefront at 1515 Broadway. The rent was not disclosed, but is

rumored to be around $10 million. The space was formerly occupied by the MTV Store and is at the bottom of a 54-floor building between 44th and 45th streets. MTV’s parent, Viacom, has its headquarters inside the building, and landlord SL Green announced a successful $475 million refinancing of the building earlier this month. Newmark Knight Frank’s Je"rey Roseman represented SL Green.

BY ROLAND LI


We congratulate the following brokerage fi rms for leasing 1,271,850 square feet within our portfolio and earning over

$12.3 million in commissions on signing during 2009.

100% COMMISSION PAID ON LEASE SIGNING

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For more information regarding Malkin Properties please contact:Jeffrey H. [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] (203) 353-5200 (914) 328-4800

CB Richard Ellis, Inc.Howard Properties, Ltd. Rakow Commercial Realty Group, Inc.

TEN BANK STREETAt the White Plains Transportation Center

CB Richard Ellis, Inc.

MERRITTVIEWExit 40A off the Merritt Pkwy., or Super 7 Expressway, Exit 2

Howard Properties, Ltd. Newmark Knight Frank

500 MAMARONECK AVENUEI-95, Exit 18B West or Hutchinson River Pkwy., Exit 23 South

CM Realty, Inc. Plaza Realty & Management Corp.

METRO CENTERAt the Stamford Transportation Center

FIRST STAMFORD PLACEAt the Stamford Transportation Center

Cushman & Wakefi eld, Inc. Gretsch Commercial Real Estate

501 SEVENTH AVENUEAt 37th Street

The Hunter Realty Organization, LLCNewmark Knight FrankWharton Property Advisors, Inc.

Jonathan [email protected]

250 WEST 57TH STREETBetween Broadway and Eighth Ave.

Adams & Company, LLCCB Richard Ellis, Inc.The Lansco Corporation Sierra Realty Corporation Studley Inc.Williamson, Picket, Gross, Inc.

George Fabian [email protected]

ONE GRAND CENTRAL PLACE60 East 42nd Street

Bergson Strategies, LLC Capstone Realty Advisors, Inc.CB Richard Ellis, Inc.CitySites Commercial Group, Inc.Colliers ABR, Inc. CresaPartners Cushman & Wakefi eld, Inc. E&B Real Estate George Comfort & Sons, Inc.Grubb & Ellis Company Herbert Sanders, Inc. Howard Properties, Ltd.Jones Lang LaSalle The Juster Group Manhattan Commercial Realty Corp. Miyad Realty, LLC Newmark Knight Frank Paragon Group, LLC Redac, Inc. Richard D. Duryea, Inc. Signature Partners, LLC Studley Inc. Thomas P. Reilly & Co. UGL Equis Venture Capital Partners, Inc.Winslow & Company LLC

William G. [email protected]

1350 BROADWAYAt 35th Street

Jonathan T. [email protected]

CB Richard Ellis, Inc.Cushman & Wakefi eld, Inc. Denham Wolf Real Estate ServicesFirstService Williams George Comfort & Sons, Inc. Grubb & Ellis Company Intrepid Real Estate Group Jones Lang LaSalle Newmark Knight Frank Smith Mack Winick Realty Group LLC


Cushman & Wakefi eld, Inc.

Brandl [email protected]

112 WEST 34TH STREETBetween Broadway and Seventh Ave.

Audrey Coe [email protected]

Cushman & Wakefi eld, Inc. Metropolitan Property GroupStudley Inc.

Cushman & Wakefi eld, Inc. JTRE


Michael Frantz [email protected]


Colliers ABR, Inc.Cushman & Wakefi eld, Inc.

www.malkinproperties.com

William G. [email protected]

EMPIRE STATE BUILDING350 Fifth Avenue

Albert J. Duryea, Inc.Capstone Realty Advisors, Inc.Colliers ABR, Inc.Cushman & Wakefi eld, Inc.Dakota Realty GroupEFA Realty, Inc. Grubb & Ellis CompanyThe Hunter Realty Organization, LLCThe Lansco CorporationNewmark Knight Frank New York Realty Inc. Winick Realty Group LLC

Brandl [email protected]


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Markus Leaves Thankless Role

Marvin Markus resigned late last year as the chair of the Rent Guidelines Board, which sets rents for the city’s one million rent-regu-lated units. As chair, Mr. Markus, a managing director at Goldman Sachs, was yelled at dur-ing public meetings and received the nick-name of “Marvin Markup” from critics who characterized him as pro-landlord. He served for eight years under Mayor Bloomberg and five years under Mayor Ed Koch.

FirstService Williams Rebranding as Colliers

FirstService Williams will become part of Colliers International, the world’s third-largest commercial real estate firm. First-Service Williams will adopt Colliers’ name and branding and become the company’s tristate hub. Mark Jaccom, CEO of First-

Service, will continue as CEO for the New York–Tri-State region, which consists of 300 employees in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut. Colliers has more than 15,000 employees in 480 o!ces in 61 countries.

Stuy Town Lenders Breaking Thumbs

Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Vil-lage debt holders are demanding payments

from owners Tishman Speyer and Blackrock within the next few days, reports Bloomberg. A group led by Winthrop Realty Trust holds about $300 million in senior mezzanine debt and said in a letter it intends to pursue a fore-closure sale. Tishman and Blackrock already missed a $16.1 million payment on the apart-ments two weeks ago, and have yet to make a workout proposal to the mezzanine lenders.

Artwork in Lower Manhattan

The Alliance for Downtown New York is in-stalling five new works of public art in Lower Manhattan in January. The new locations in-clude the East River Waterfront Esplanade at South Street; 99 Church Street; West Thames Park in Battery Park City; Fiterman Hall in Bor-ough of Manhattan Community College; and 56 Leonard Street. The works are part of the Re:Construction program, launched in 2007 to improve the appearance of Lower Manhat-tan from Houston Street to the Battery. The program received a $1.5 million grant last year from the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation for about 30 projects over three years.

Spielberg’s WTC Documentary

Director Stephen Spielberg will produce a television documentary series on the re-building of the World Trade Center, reports the BBC. The series will air on the Science Channel in 2011 and chronicle the engineer-ing and building of the 1,776-foot Freedom Tower, which is to be completed in 2013. The show will use 3-D, time-lapse cameras, com-puter modeling techniques and other meth-ods to chart the construction.

THE WEEK IN REAL ESTATE


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Zell Buys Out Boymelgreen

Developer Sam Zell’s Equity Res-idential bought out Shaya Boymel-green’s interest in a piece of land at the southwest corner of 10th Avenue and 23rd Street, reports the New York Post. Equity paid Mr. Boymel-green $11.25 million for a long-term ground lease and bought the land from others for $750,000, according to records. The Department of Build-ings’ filings propose a 13-story proj-ect on the 100-by-135-foot parcel,

to include a fitness center, commu-nity room and 96 apartments. The building will also have an elevator and stairway entrance to the nearby High Line.

A Busy 40 Wall for Trumps

The Trump Organization leased 252,790 square feet of leases at 40 Wall Street last year and has a “hand-

shake” on another 61,721 square feet, reports the New York Post. Another 40,000 to 50,000 square feet are in “discussions,” said Donald Trump Jr. “Rather than trying to squeeze blood out of the market, we are see-ing where it’s realistic to make a deal and not screwing around over the last 15 cents,” he told the Post.

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THE WEEK IN REAL ESTATE January 12-19

CBRE’s Steve Siegel: Real Estate Will Once Again Soar ‘Like a Shooting Star’

Painfully early Wednesday morning, Jan. 13, on the 18th floor of the MetLife Building, CB Richard Ellis’ Global Brokerage chairman, Stephen Siegel, the patriarch of New York’s brokerage community, held forth on the future of New York commercial real estate.

“This city will bounce back faster than any city in the world,” said Mr. Siegel, who admitted he’s thought to be something of a bull, though he considers himself a “realist.” “Once it begins its real turn around the corner, it’s going to shoot like a shooting star.”

Mr. Siegel’s fellow presenter, executive managing director Matt Van Buren, backed up the sunny prognosis with some surprisingly positive statistics. First, he pointed to a surge in temp jobs, gener-ally thought to be a leading indicator of job market recovery. And, as Mr. Van Buren pointed out, “For us, employment is extremely, ex-tremely important and the factor we track the closest.” Jobs require people. People require o!ces. O!ces require o!ce buildings. You get the picture.

In the same vein, Mr. Van Buren said the amount of available space in the o!ce market seems to be stabilizing. So are rents. And, the dif-ference between asking and taking rents—which is directly correlat-ed to how much power tenants have in negotiations with would-be landlords—is diminishing. Meanwhile, the amount of sublease space is shrinking.

Mr. Siegel was even bullish on downtown, in stark contrast to rival Cushman & Wakefield’s assertion a day earlier that the vacancy rate in downtown Manhattan could soar to 15.75 percent. He pointed to ten-ants making long-term commitments in Lower Manhattan, like law firm Stroock & Stroock & Lavan’s renewal of its 225,000-square-foot lease at Joe Moinian’s 180 Maiden Lane, and even predicted that Mer-rill Lynch (a.k.a. Bank of America), which has a multimillion-square-foot lease expiring in 2013 and a brand-new skyscraper in midtown, would stay put.

“This is a very resilient city, and downtown is going to be right at the heart of it,” Mr. Siegel said.

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BY DANA RUBINSTEIN

Winston & Strawn, the international, Chicago-based law firm whose ros-ter of famous clients included Illi-

nois embarrassment Rod Blagojevich until he stopped paying his hefty legal bills, is appar-ently expanding.

The firm has hired real estate brokerage Studley, which specializes in representing

tenants, to search for about 250,000 square feet of o!ce space in Manhattan, according to information released at CB Richard Ellis’ quarterly breakfast last week.

The firm’s lease at the MetLife Building at 200 Park Avenue—the tower connected to Grand Central Terminal—is up in about two years, according to industry sources. Win-ston & Strawn has expanded into more than 200,000 square feet at 200 Park, more than double the original 90,000 square feet it took when it signed there in 1995.

Which is not to say that all is fine and dan-dy at the firm. Legal blog Above the Law has reported that salaries for 2008 associates were frozen in 2009, that the firm has laid o"

sta" and that there have been deferrals of in-coming associates.

A spokesman for Winston & Strawn de-clined to comment, as did Studley chairman and CEO Mitch Steir.

Winston & Strawn hires Studley for 250K-foot hunt

Former Blago Firm of Record Looking

The firm’s lease at the MetLife Building at 200 Park Avenue—the tower connected to Grand Central Terminal—is up in about two years, according to industry sources.

PROSPECTIVE TENANT

TENANT:Winston & Strawn

LOOKING FOR:About 250,000 square feet

BROKER:Studley

LIKELIHOOD WILL MOVE:

3.75 trucks (out of five)

200 Park Avenue.

Mitch Steir.

Reach the people who own, manage, lease and sell space in the city

by advertising your deals in the

Contact Robyn Weiss, Associate Publisher, for more information: 212.407.9382

[email protected]


BY DANA RUBINSTEIN

A relic of the boom-time era—the sale of buildings in bundles, like cigarettes in a pack, or strips malls in Florida—has re-

emerged for a brief cameo.In December, Massey Knakal sold a portfo-

lio of nine apartment buildings in Upper Man-hattan for $26.9 million, which, aside from a Sam Chang portfolio of hotels sold to his bud-dies at Rhode Island’s Magna Hospitality, was both the largest portfolio sale of 2009 and the largest sale of any kind in Upper Manhattan, according to analysts at Real Capital Analytics and the brokerage.

The nine apartment buildings, containing about 230 units, are 125-127 East 118th Street; 149 East 118th Street; 121 East 119th Street; 125 East 119th Street; 166 East 119th Street; 158 East 119th Street; 212 East 119th Street; 135 East 122nd Street; and 2010 Lexington Avenue.

Mind you, the sale of the buildings as a portfolio does not indicate some sort of re-emerging trend, à la the Pinnacle or Vantage

days of yore.“This had to be sold as a portfolio because

it was under Section 8,” said Massey Knakal’s Mike Tortorici, who, with brokerage partner Shimon Shkury, represented the sellers, the Seattle-based Security Properties. “When commercial MBS was available, it was easier for people to package together loans and as-semble large pieces of real estate. Now, it’s much easier for banks to finance smaller build-ings, much as it’s easier for buyers to swallow smaller buildings.”

Francine Kellman, associate director of buyer Pacific Housing Advisers, described the firm’s plans thusly: “We certainly plan on keeping the property a!ordable for the next 30 years and most likely longer than that. We are doing over $40,000 a unit in rehab, includ-ing all major systems, work in apartments, social services, laundry rooms, new manage-ment o"ce, etc.”

“My motto is, ‘Today’s preservation is to-morrow’s revitalization.’”

[email protected]

Yes! Boom-time relic pops up as nine apartment buildings trade for $26.9 M.

Upper Manhattan’s Biggest ’09 Sale Was ... a Portfolio?

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PRO

PERT

Y SH

ARK

LEASE BEAT BY EMILY GEMINDER

LEASE OF THE WEEK

40 West 53rd Street“No object is an island” might be the

motto of the Milan-based Triennale De-sign Museum, which skims from Italian design to urban planning to contemporary fashion in its exhibits exploring the rela-tionship between industry and art. Set to debut in time for the International Con-temporary Furniture Fair in May, the mu-seum’s New York branch will open at 40 West 53rd Street across the street from the Museum of Modern Art.

The Paramount-owned building was left vacant when the Museum of Arts & Design moved to Columbus Circle two years ago. Cushman & Wakefield’s Michael Stone, who represented Tri-ennale with David Tricarico, called the museum’s 15-year lease “one of this year’s most significant retail deals.” The 18,067-square-foot lease encompasses four levels; in addition to exhibit space, the building will house a museum shop and cafe. “It brings a ma-jor cultural icon to Manhat-tan,” Mr. Stone said.

Paramount was repre-sented in-house by Arthur Bocchi and the Cushman & Wakefield team of Gene Spiegelman, Michael O’Neill and Mark Lauzon.

Triennale Design Museum Taking Big Space in Paramount’s 40 West 53rd

17 Eighth Avenue Left Bank Books narrow-

ly avoided adding its name to the ever-mounting casualty list of New York independent bookstores. After 18 years, the landlord of the tiny West Vil-lage shop it called home refused to renew its lease. As per the usu-al post-Kindle indie-bookstore plot line, that was almost the end. But in an unusual turn of fate, Left Bank was literally granted a new lease—a loyal customer pointed the owners to a vacant storefront just around the corner.

The bookstore inked a five-year lease at 17 Eighth Avenue, where it will reopen

this week. With it will come stacks and stacks of rare and used books, including Nor-man Mailer’s personal copy of The Naked and the Dead. The book’s hefty price tag will come, too: $10,000. While that may seem ex-orbitant, consider the store’s long list of rea-sons why buying a first edition is a good invest-

ment. Besides impressing your friends and making yourself

look smarter, it also cements your rela-tionship with the author. Though whether that’s an endorsement of the $10,000 Naked and the Dead is another thing.

Take That, Kindle! Indie Bookstore Survives With West Village Relocation


swigequities.com

T!" S#$% E&'$( $") D*#+(*#+ C*,,"-($*+A r t i s t r y i n o w n e r s h i p ®

Swig Equities congratulates and proudly salutes

Todd E. Korren, SVP/Director of Leasing & Operations,

as recipient of REBNY’SYoung Real Estate Man of the Year Award

Todd E. Korren

48,000 square feet 400,000 square feet 324,000 square feet 350,000 square feet 325,000 square feet 400,000 square feet 900,000 square feet


LEASE BEAT

111 Eighth AvenueThe amount of silicon in Man-

hattan just got bigger. Since Google first occupied the old Port Author-ity building at 111 Eighth Avenue back in 2006, New York has been rife with speculation about the day-to-day exploits of the Inter-net empire. What’s it like to work there? Is it true there’s a slide? Is it a cult? Are they building a parallel Internet? Will dark matter one day be used for server farms?

Google, in its characteristical-ly covert manner, has let on little about what goes on its New York of-fices (it has since opened an auxilia-ry o!ce in Chelsea Market as well): Reporters who enter sign nondis-closure agreements; its communi-cation team is a sleek firewall. But whatever they’re doing, they’re do-ing more of it—the search engine signed a lease for 57,000 additional square feet in the block-swallowing Taconic-owned building.

David Hollander, Stephen B. Siegel and Ken Rapp of CB Rich-ard Ellis represented Google in the deal.

Google Gobbles 57K More Feet in Taconic’s 111 Eighth

44 West 47th StreetAmong the tenets

of engagement ring shopping are what’s come to be known as the four Cs: cut, col-or, clarity and carat weight. But few out-side the diamond world know the o r g a n i z a t i o n that pioneered the now famous standards. The G e m o l o g i -cal Institute of America, head-quartered in Carls-bad, Calif., has been quietly and methodical-ly studying gems for almost 80 years.

At Extell’s International Gem Tow-er, the 34-story diamond district building set for completion by 2012, the GIA will take an entire floor, nearly 30,000 square feet. “We look forward

to relocating our New York labo-ratory operations into a sin-

gle floor of the IGT,” said the GIA’s head Donna

Baker, who add-ed that the move would increase e!ciency and help the non-profit organiza-

tion manage its long-term costs.

The GIA’s New York laboratory houses re-

search into, among oth-er things, the development

of detection techniques for treated and synthetic diamonds.

Gary Barnett, president of the Extell Development Company, said, “This prestigious institute clearly rec-ognizes the value the development brings to New York’s diamond dis-trict and we’re thrilled to have them on board.”

Gem Judges Sign Up for Floor at Extell’s Future Diamond District Tower


H O L D I N G S

17 Battery Place 150 Bay Street 560 Broadway 594 Broadway 740 Broadway 1560 Broadway 80-90 Eighth Avenue 322 Eighth Avenue 505 Eighth Avenue520 Eighth Avenue 206 Fifth Avenu 230 Fifth Avenue The Flatiron Building 333 Hudson Stree 767 Lexington Avenue 171 Madison Avenu 515 Madison Avenue630 Ninth Avenue 305 Seventh Avenu 5 South Broadway 5-9 Union Square Wes 7 Union Square Wes 200 Varick Street 379 West Broadway 0 Worth Street125 West 3rd Stree 307 West 36th Stree 247 West 37th Stree 209-219 West 38th Stree 318-326 West 39th Stree 414-422 West 45th Street

would like to thank all of the tenants and brokers involved in these recent deals:

For further information, please contact: Eric Gural at 212.372.2021 or Brian Steinwurtzel at 212.372.2091

Strength and Continuity in any Economic Climate - Over 1 Million SF Leased in 2009

200 Varick Street

108,000 SFLee Feld - Feld Real Estate

40 Worth Street

265,000 SFEric Deutsch, Ken Meyerson, Kevin Powderly - CBRE

The purchase of the fee simple interest

515 Madison AvenueCorner of 53rd Street and Madison Avenue

340,000 SFFinancing by Wells Fargo Special thanks to Woody Heller - Studleyand Paul Talbot - Newmark Knight Frank

420 West 45th Street

70,000 SFPaul Wolf, Amy Lawrence - Denham Wolf RES

OmnicomGroup

40 Worth StreetNYC Department of Health - Roy Lapidus, Dan Segal, Jeff Gural - Newmark Knight Frank

Code, INC. - Roy Lapidus, Dan Segal - Newmark Knight FrankJerome S. Gillman Consultants - Roy Lapidus, Dan Segal - Newmark Knight Frank

200 Varick StreetDesign Tex Group, Inc. - Alex Jinishina - FirstService Williams

Charity Global, Inc. - Eric Gural - Newmark Knight Frank515 Madison Avenue

TCRM Advisors - Eric Gural - Newmark Knight FrankWildes and Weinberg - Adam Wildes - Base Realty

Protravel - Eric Gural - Newmark Knight FrankFisam - Lance Korman - Newmark Knight Frank

Fox River Execution Technology - Rob Silver, Neil Rubin - Newmark Knight FrankHarrier Hawk - Daniel Madison, John Moran, Daniel Hassett - Newmark Knight Frank

Hampton Capital - Daniel Madison, Josh Friedman, Neil Goldmacher - Newmark Knight Frank

National Payment - Steven Rotter - Jones Lang LaSalle

James Alpha - Keith Caggiano - CBREHamilton Investments - Corey Horowitz - Newmark Knight Frank

RockFleet - Esther Zar - Murray Hill PropertiesDigital Tech - Eric Gural - Newmark Knight Frank

Lepol - Eric Gural - Newmark Knight Frank Midtown Chiropractic - David Levy - Adams & Company Real Estate

318 West 39th StreetModel Management - Matthew Mandell, Brian Steinwurtzel - Newmark Knight Frank

Stenay - Matthew Mandell - Newmark Knight Frank247 West 37th Street

Action Against Hunger - Matthew Mandell, Brian Steinwurtzel - Newmark Knight FrankLB Studio - Bruce Kurzman - Newmark Knight Frank

Glory Studio - Bruce Kurzman - Newmark Knight Frank80 8th Avenue

209 West 38th Street

505 8th AvenueBig Apple Circus - Jeff Gural - Newmark Knight Frank

520 8th AvenueGeneral Vision - Brian Waterman, Brent Ozarowski - Newmark Knight FrankEmerging Vision - Brian Waterman, Brent Ozarowski - Newmark Knight Frank

Fund for the City of NY - Glenn Markman, Joseph Cirone - Cushman & WKallen & Lemelson LLP - Richard Plehn, Greg Wang - First Service Willams

Noah Insurance - Matthew Mandell - Newmark Knight FrankKIPP Foundation - Allen Gurevich - Newmark Knight Frank

Ripple 6 - Allen Gurevich - Newmark Knight FrankASPCA - Matthew Mandell, Brian Steinwurtzel - Newmark Knight Frank

SSS Sales - Matthew Mandell - Newmark Knight Frank75 South Broadway

GSA - Richard Goldstein - Goldstein & AssociatesMillennium Business Centers - Patricia Valenti, Hilarie Siles - Newmark Knight Frank

560 BroadwayZorbit Resources, LLC - Donna Vogel - Newmark Knight Frank

16 West 22 Street1521 WSL Corp. - Lenard Rosenblatt - Botsaris Realty

Teak Fellowship - Barbara Yagoda - Newmark Knight Frank307 West 36 Street

I Trim Inc. - Bruce Kurzman - Newmark Knight FrankGreen Warehouse - Bruce Kurzman - Newmark Knight FrankGreen Land NY - Barbara Yagoda - Newmark Knight Frank

150 Bay StreetPershing LLC - Chris Hile - Jones Lang LaSalle

1560 BroadwayAmerican Immigrant Federation - Alan Steinberg - Newmark Knight Frank

Stephen Jeffries, Esq. - Gregg Espach - UGL Equis

230 5th AvenuePark B. Smith - Harvey Richer - Newmark Knight Frank

Next Creations - Harvey Richer - Newmark Knight FrankFA LLC - Harvey Richer - Newmark Knight Frank

171 Madison AvenueLawyers Alliance For New York - Amy Lawrence - Denham Wolf Real Estate

Early Intervention Center of Brooklyn - Jim Coleman - Bond New York Real Estate

630 9th AvenueMitchell Giurogola Architects - James Saunders, Noel Flagg - Newmark Knight Frank

740 BroadwayCheil USA, Inc. - Joshua Winslow - Winslow & Company

Mazel Co. - Jay Futersack - Dakota Realty

322 8th AvenueYoung Women's Leadership Network - Robert Neborak, Mort Schrader - PBS Real Estate

Woodworks Construction - David Kahane - DAK Commercial Realty 594 BroadwayThe Architectural League of New York - Sarah Eisinger - Denham WolfThe Research Associates, LLC - Jessica Hoppe - Home. Work. People

5-9 USWBusiness For Social Responsibility - Robert Lawlor - Studley

175 5th AvenueArgo Tea Co. - Jeffrey Roseman - Newmark Knight Frank


GET

TY IM

AGES

LEASE BEAT

THE SCORE

BROKERAGES THAT WORKED ON THE MOST DEALS IN THIS

WEEK’S LEASE BEAT

Adams & Co. ....................18

Newmark Knight Frank .... 6

CB Richard Ellis ............... 4

Cushman & Wakefield .......................... 4

LAST WEEK

Adams & Co. ....................14

Newmark Knight Frank ....7

CB Richard Ellis ............... 6

Cushman & Wakefield ......................... 6

ABS Partners Real Estate ...................... 6

1114 Avenue of the AmericasThe restaurant STK claims to make a

break from the hypermasculine tradition of steakhouses. With all the exaggerated curves and faux-leather of a sports car, its round booths shaped like hot tubs and club lighting to match a pounding beat, STK pulls o! a vibe that is, as its tag line goes, “not your daddy’s steakhouse.” But in its professed feminine-oriented market-ing, the proprietors are not quite so suc-cessful. The images that skid across the STK Web site do indeed include women, but only if one counts close-ups of sul-try, rouged lips teething on veiny chunks of steak and 4-inch heels digging into T-bones. It’s more like a restaurant for mis-guided straight men hoping to get through the cocktails-restaurant-club part of a date as quickly and e"ciently as possible.

The first STK opened in the meatpack-ing district three years ago, followed by lo-cations in Los Angeles and Miami. It likes to tout its status as a celebrity destination: There, Beyoncé and Jay-Z were overheard planning their wedding, and Fergie was spotted smooching. The Grace Building in

midtown will house the concept’s second New York restaurant, a 9,000-square-foot space with an outdoor patio. The concave building, owned by Brookfield Properties and the Swig Company, was represented by Ed Hogan. Kim Mogull of Mogull Realty represented STK.

“Midtown is on the cusp of a dining resur-gence,” said Jonathan Segal, CEO of the ONE Group, the high-end hospitality company that runs the restau-rant. STK’s menu—though the menu is really beside the point—includes mini gourmet Big Macs and foie gras French toast as well as considerations for the restricted-in-take set: Steaks come in small, medium and large.

Funky, Fun STK Steakhouse Graces 1114 Sixth With Second City Spot


PRO

PERT

Y SH

ARK

LEASE BEAT

512 BroadwayThe latest in the parade of trendy,

budget-conscious European apparel companies to make their way to the U.S. (somehow America just can’t do edgy-cheap) is AllSaints, a Brit-ish retailer with a London rocker sensibility. Having graduated from a Bloomingdale’s mini-boutique, its U.S. debut has reached full-fledged store status with a Soho location opening in late spring.

Thor Equities signed the retail-er to a 15-year lease at 512 Broad-way. Spread out over three floors, the store will comprise more than 22,000 square feet. “On any given day, pedestrian tra!c rivals the bus-iest shopping districts on Fifth Ave-nue or 34th Street,” Thor’s Joe Sitt said of the area in a statement.

77 Water StreetWith its 75,716-square-foot lease

at 77 Water Street, Los Angeles–headquartered law firm Lewis Bris-bois Bisgaard & Smith has more than doubled its Lower Manhattan o!ce space. Moving down the street from its o!ces at 199 Water, the law firm signed a 10-year deal with Goldman Sachs, which is subleas-ing the entire building. Goldman, which never occupied the building, will cover the entire cost of Lewis Brisbois’ build-out. The lease covers three floors, according to Crain’s.

“Lewis Brisbois hit the market at just the right time,” said Marc Shapses, the Studley broker who represented the law firm with Craig McKenna. “The firm had outgrown its space at 199 Water. With several well-priced, quality options in the marketplace, we were able to take our time to determine the most ap-propriate building with space that could accommodate the firm’s size today, as well as in the future, with

the right economics.”Adam Foster of CB Richard Ellis

also represented the tenant. Cushman & Wakefield’s Louis D’Avanzo and Robert Constable repped Goldman.

L.A. Law Firm Grabs Three Floors at 77 Water; Goldman

to Pay for Build-Out

Brookfield Properties has big renova-tion plans for its World Financial Center in downtown Manhattan,

according to Crain’s Theresa Agovino.“Sources briefed on plans say Brook-

field wants to create an entirely new entrance on West Street, eliminate the grand staircase which leads down to the signature Winter Garden from the east, and add more retail space. The company plans to present its ideas to its board next month for approval, according to one source close to company. Those briefed on the plans weren’t given cost estimates or a timetable for the changes. Brookfield had no immediate comment.”

The plans come as the downtown vacan-cy rate is expected to rise sharply, perhaps

in part because of the possible exits of both Merrill Lynch and Deloitte, both major tenants of World Financial Center.

“Merrill Lynch currently rents 3 million square feet at the center, but its lease ex-pires in 2013. In 2008, Merrill Lynch was purchased by Bank of America, which has a new headquarters near Times Square on West 42nd Street as well as acres of other space in Manhattan. … Meanwhile, the lease on the vast bulk of the 510,000 square feet that Deloitte leases at the complex expires in three years, according to published reports. The firm has already hired Cushman & Wakefield Inc. to scout for what reports say is anywhere from 600,000 and 800,000 square feet.”

—Tom Acitelli

ON DEADLINE: BROOKFIELD’S WFC PLANS

Euro Apparel Company AllSaints Goes Marching in at Thor’s 512 Broadway

Lease Beat continues on page 36


THE LEAD INDICATOR

On both sides of the Atlantic, bankers have faltered in the public-relations management

of new profit reports. Many of the largest banks, among them both willing and grudging recipients of government support, have reported heady profits for the year just ended. The disconnect between the performance of banks and the middling perfor-mance of businesses in oth-er sectors of the American economy has cemented the popular discontent with the handling of the bank-ing crisis, and the disa!ec-tion with the banks them-selves. The most profitable banks’ attempts to fend o! a public backlash, through reduced compensation ra-tios, charitable contribu-tions and public demonstrations of circumspection, have failed to be-guile a cynical and recession-weary population.

The goal of interventions like the Troubled Asset Relief Program has been to stabilize the financial system, but it seems as though the banks have proven too resilient for the public’s taste. The fact of mul-tibillion-dollar bonus payments—coinciding with double-digit un-employment and stagnating real wages—has reinforced the percep-

tion that financial professionals op-erate in an environment detached from Main Street. And while the idea of a culturally and socioeconomically homogenous Main Street that serves as a counterpoint to Wall Street is a bizarre oversimplification, I imagine that recent reports from New York City must seem increasingly surreal the farther one lives from a coast.

The question of how to respond to bank profits and compensation has been scarcely informed by our ratio-

nal capacities. Rather, arguments on both sides of the debate have been punctuated by occasions of dema-goguery and appeals to our baser instincts. Just days before a Massa-chusetts verdict on the administra-tion’s first year, hard lines dominate in a severe contest for voter support

and a balance of power in the Senate.

In proposing a new bank levy last Thursday, Presi-dent Obama was unequivo-cal: “My commitment is to recover every single dime the American people are owed. And my determina-tion to achieve this goal is only heightened when I see reports of massive profits and obscene bonuses at the very firms who owe their continued existence to the

American people.” Lest the message be lost, this Saturday’s weekly ad-dress from the White House was ti-tled “Getting Our Money Back From Wall Street.” Unconstrained by po-litical niceties, Paul Krugman was exceedingly direct in his Jan. 14 New York Times op-ed: “As Congress and the administration try to reform the financial system, they should ignore advice coming from the supposed wise men of Wall Street, who have no wisdom to o!er.” For their part, bank executives have intimated that

any new tax on profits will slow the sector’s recovery and, by extension, recovery in markets thirsty for cred-it.

One’s perspective is crucial in all of this. To the public, JP-Morgan Chase’s estimated sal-

ary and bonus compensation of $27 billion might seem purposely pro-vocative. But it is less so when one considers that the firm has roughly 200,000 employees on its payroll.

The bank’s chairman and chief exec-utive, Jamie Dimon, said that earn-ings “fell short of both an adequate return on capital and the firm’s earn-ings potential.” Nor were investors overawed by the results. At least one analyst described the earnings re-port as “disappointing.”

The administration has commu-nicated its perspective clearly. Its proposal to recompense taxpayers—the Financial Crisis Responsibility Fee—includes a levy on financial ser-vices firms with assets in excess of $50 billion, irrespective of whether a firm received TARP funding. As of the third quarter of 2009, roughly 35 bank holding companies and 15 other institutions would have met this cri-terion. The 0.15 percentage point fee on eligible liabilities would be paid over time, raising an estimated $90 billion to $117 billion over 10 years. The exact terms of the proposal are expected in the February budget proposal and will ultimately require Congressional approval. Depending upon the outcome of Tuesday’s Sen-ate contest in Massachusetts and in-tense industry lobbying, this may be a significant obstacle.

In the meantime, other branches of government are acting on their own initiative. Last Monday, Attor-ney General Andrew Cuomo sent requests to the eight original TARP recipients demanding informa-tion on their compensation plans. The F.D.I.C. met in open session last Tuesday, releasing an advance no-tice of proposed rule making that might ultimately relate banks’ De-posit Insurance Fund contributions to risk-taking incentives in insti-tutions’ compensation structures: “The FDIC does not seek to limit the amount which employees are com-pensated, but rather is concerned with adjusting risk-based deposit insurance assessment rates … to ad-equately compensate the DIF for the risks inherent in the design of cer-tain compensation programs.” Even among the meeting participants, consensus over the proposal proved elusive.

Apart from the F.D.I.C. proposal, should we believe analysts’ expres-sions of concern regarding the Re-sponsibility Fee’s slowing the recov-ery of the largest banks and insurers? As long as the target institutions’ profit-maximizing motivations are not upset, and as long as they re-main profitable, the fee should not impact the market’s observable out-comes. After-tax profits will be un-dercut. But the basic incentives and

disincentives to lend will remain in place. Of course, the incidence of the tax—who ultimately bears the bur-den of the tax if the bank is able to pass it along—may fall to employ-ees or to clients. In the short term, the direct cost is borne by the banks themselves, satisfying the public in advance of election dates.

Across the pond, where a par-liamentary election is just months away, the outlook is less sanguine. Under the leadership of Prime Min-ister Gordon Brown, Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling an-nounced last month the introduc-tion of a so-called “supertax” of 50 percent on bankers’ bonuses in ex-cess of £25,000. The tax has been decried for undermining the com-petitiveness of London as one of the world’s financial centers. It is unlike-ly, however, that the one-time shock to income will materially impact the market, even if the incidence of the tax falls to the professionals in the institutions’ employ. The mayor of London contends that 9,000 bankers will flee the city to avoid the penalty, but little analysis has been present-

ed to substantiate this claim. The more pernicious undertaking

is an increase in the nation’s mar-ginal income tax rate for its high-est earners. Unlike the one-time tax, this permanent shock to personal disposable income will render Lon-don less competitive. At least on the margin, the balance of agglomera-tion and cost will weigh against Lon-don and in favor of its peers. Even if our own high-skilled labor pool is less mobile, American lawmakers should heed the warning bells being sounded in London when consider-ing similar options at home.

The Webcast of the president’s Weekend Address on the Financial Crisis Responsibility Fee is avail-able at the White House Web site at http://bit.ly/4yudli. A fact sheet on the Financial Crisis Responsibil-ity Fee is also available at http://bit.ly/7NuOzA.

[email protected]

Sam Chandan, Ph.D., is president and chief economist of Real Estate Econometrics and an adjunct pro-fessor of real estate at Wharton.

Government on both sides of the Atlantic strike at bank compensation—to what end?

When the Levy Breaks

In the meantime, other branches of government are act-ing on their own initiative. Last Monday, Attorney General Andrew Cuomo sent requests to the eight original TARP recipients, demanding information on their compensation plans. The F.D.I.C. met in open session last Tuesday, releas-ing an advance notice of proposed rule making that might ultimately relate banks’ Deposit Insurance Fund contribu-tions to risk-taking incentives in institutions’ compensation structures.

Sam ChandanColumnist


PARAMOUNT GROUPCONGRATULATES

ALL HONOREES &Our Very Own

RALPH J. DIRUGGIERORECIPIENT OF

THE GEORGE M. BROOKER MANAGEMENT EXECUTIVE OF THE YEAR AWARD

REAL ESTATE BOARD OF NEW YORK

www.paramount-group.com212.237.3100

NEW YORK - WASHINGTON, D.C. - SAN FRANCISCO

For more information:1633 Broadway, 712 Fifth Avenue, 745 Fifth Avenue, 31 West 52nd Street and 60 Wall Street

Please contact Arthur Bocchi 212.237.3122 [email protected] Avenue of the Americas, 1325 Avenue of the Americas, 900 Third Avenue, Candler Tower and 440 Ninth Avenue

Please contact James A.VanderVliet 212.237.3119 [email protected]

observer.com | the commercial observer24 January 19, 2010 the commercial observer | observer.com January 19, 2010 25

The Real Estate Board of New York on Jan. 21 plans to honor several commercial real estate

professionals at its 114th an-nual banquet. Four of the hon-orees are featured below, and check out on page 30 our Pow-er Broker profile of Todd Korren of Swig Equities, winner of the 2010 Young Real Estate Man of the Year Award.

ÍÍÍ

Samuel H. LindenbaumCounsel, Kramer Levin Naftalis &

Frankel LLPWinner of the Harry B. Helmsley Dis-

tinguished New Yorker Award, which memorializes Helmsley, his generation’s most admired real estate executive.

Sandy Lindenbaum is of counsel to Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel and a member of its land-use department.

For more than 40 years, Mr. Linden-baum’s extensive experience in land use and zoning has been put to work in han-dling special permits, zoning changes, variances, landmark proceedings, air rights transfers, tax abatements and eco-nomic development incentives for many of the city’s most prominent commercial and residential developments and for the expansion programs of many of the city’s leading nonprofit institutions.

His a!liations include the Real Es-tate Board of New York, vice president and member of the executive commit-tee of the Board of Governors; Met-ropolitan Museum of Art, honorary trustee; American Friends of the Isra-el Museum, honorary chairman of the executive committee of the Board of Directors; Peggy Guggenheim Collec-tion in Venice, member of the adviso-ry board; Guild Hall of East Hampton, member of the Board of Trustees; Cen-tral Synagogue, member of the Board of Trustees; Jewish Association for Ser-vices for the Aged, chair of the execu-tive committee; Association for a Bet-ter New York, founder, director and vice president; UJA Federation of New York, member of the board of the real estate committee; Real Estate Institute of Ba-

ruch College, member of the Board of Trustees; New York State Council on

the Arts, member, 1976-1986, 1994-1999.

Mr. Lindenbaum earned a B.A. cum laude from Harvard College in 1956 and a J.D. cum

laude in 1959 from Harvard Law School. After graduating from law school, he was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship. He married Linda M. Lewis in 1957. They have two married daughters, Er-ica Tishman and Laurie Lindenbaum, and six grandchildren.

ÍÍÍ

David R. GreenbaumPresident, Vornado Realty Trust,

New York divisionWinner of the Bernard H. Mendik Life-

time Leadership in Real Estate Award, which is named for Bernard H. Mendik, REBNY’s chairperson from 1992 until his death, in 2001.

David R. Greenbaum is president of Vornado O!ce, the New York o!ce di-vision of Vornado Realty Trust, which owns a commercial real estate portfolio in New York City that encompasses 52 buildings totaling 22 million square feet. Mr. Greenbaum oversees all aspects of the New York City portfolio, including ground-up development, redevelop-ment, leasing and building operations.

He started his career as a tax attor-ney at Weil Gotshal & Manges, and then joined the Mendik Company, a private owner of commercial real estate, which merged into Vornado Realty Trust in 1997.

Mr. Greenbaum is a trustee and mem-ber of the executive committee of the Citizens Budget Commission, a private watchdog organization that monitors the city’s and state’s fiscal policies; a member of the executive committee of the Board of Governors of the Real Estate Board of New York; a member of the Realty Advi-sory Board; and a member of the Board of Directors for the 34th Street Partnership, the Grand Central Partnership and the Times Square Alliance, all public-private e"orts to enhance midtown. He is also a

member of the New York University Real Estate Institute’s advisory board and the executive roundtable committee of the advisory board. Mr. Greenbaum also serves on the boards of the Jewish Na-tional Fund as a presidential adviser, the Jewish Guild for the Blind and the Jef-fery Modell Foundation. He was selected by the New York City Partnership to par-ticipate in the David Rockefeller Fellows Program.

ÍÍÍ

Robert A. KnakalChairman, Founding Partner,

Massey Knakal Realty ServicesWinner of the Louis Smadbeck Bro-

ker Recognition Award, which honors the memory of one of the profession’s most esteemed practitioners.

Robert Knakal graduated from the Wharton School of Business at the Uni-versity of Pennsylvania with a bach-elor’s of science in economics in 1984. He majored in real estate finance and entrepreneurial management and was a member of the Wharton School’s Real Estate Club.

In 1981, Mr. Knakal was hired by Coldwell Banker Commercial, now CB Richard Ellis, as a market research in-tern. He returned the following sum-mer as co-leader of its summer market research group and, in 1983, obtained his real estate sales license. He worked that summer at Coldwell Banker as an assistant to a senior broker. After grad-uation, he started as a full-time invest-ment property specialist with CB’s mid-town o!ce.

In 1984, Mr. Knakal collaborated with Paul Massey Jr. to establish a property sales group in Manhattan. They served as co-directors for the new specializa-tion, and, in 1986, shared CB’s presti-gious top salesman award in New York. (At that time, CB employed an average of 60 people in its Manhattan o!ce.) Messrs. Knakal and Massey retained this top ranking until they left the firm in November 1988 to start their own business, Massey Knakal Realty Servic-es. To date, Mr. Knakal has been respon-

sible for the sale of more than 1,050 properties worth over $5.8 billion.

Mr. Knakal was in 1993 elected presi-dent of the National Realty Conference, which made him the youngest president in the organization’s 58-year history. He is also a very involved member of REB-NY. He has served on numerous com-mittees, including the ethics committee and the arbitration committee, and has been chairman of its sales brokers com-mittee. He was also on the Commer-cial Division’s Board of Directors, and was elected to the Board of Governors. In 2003, Mr. Knakal was appointed to REBNY’s executive committee.

Mr. Knakal won, along with broker Mark Massey, the prestigious Robert T. Lawrence Award in the REBNY Most Ingenious Deal of the Year contest for their nine-year assemblage of the east-erly blockfront of Second Avenue be-tween 54th and 55th streets.

In 2005, Mr. Knakal led the market-ing team for the $138.5 million sale of the Vanderveer Estates in Brooklyn, the largest privately owned apartment complex in the borough. The proper-ty consisted of 2,500 apartments in 59 elevator buildings. The sale price was $138,500,000. In 2006, Mr. Knakal led the marketing team in the assem-blage of the entire western blockfront on Sixth Avenue between 30th and 31st streets. This marked Massey Knakal’s largest development transaction to date, at a price of $117,500,000.

ÍÍÍ

Ralph J. DiRuggieroVice President, Property Manage-

ment, Paramount Group,Winner of the George M. Brooker

Management Executive of the Year Award, which honors the memory of the late Mr. Brooker, the first vice president for REBNY’s Management Division and one of the profession’s most respected members.

Ralph DiRuggiero holds a bachelor’s of science from the University of Scran-ton and a master’s of public administra-tion from Baruch College. He also attend-

ed Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government program for senior execu-tives in state and local government.

Mr. DiRuggiero began his career as a budget analyst at the city’s O!ce of Man-agement and Budget. He then worked as the assistant budget director for Es-sex County, N.J., eventually rising to be-come the assistant county administrator for New Jersey’s largest urban county. In 1987, he joined Williams Real Estate Company as a district manager respon-sible for a midtown portfolio of o!ce buildings, and shortly thereafter was promoted to assistant vice president.

Mr. DiRuggiero then joined Swig Weil-er & Arnow Management Company as its vice president of operations respon-sible for 6 million square feet of Class A o!ces in Manhattan. In 1989, he joined Equitable Real Estate Investment Man-agement as asset manager, and, for the next 10 years, was responsible for estab-lishing the New York regional o!ce of Compass Management & Leasing, a sub-sidiary of Equitable. In 1994, he was pro-moted to senior vice president, respon-sible for Compass’ national corporate accounts, including AT&T, Lucent Tech-nologies, AMP Inc. and General Motors. Mr. DiRuggiero completed assignments in Mexico City and in the Netherlands for Lucent, and was a member of Com-pass’ management committee. As the firm merged with Jones Lang LaSalle, Mr. DiRuggiero was promoted to execu-tive vice president with responsibilities for corporate clients.

In 1999, Mr. DiRuggiero joined the Trammell Crow Company as senior vice president of property management and as its regional director for the Northeast, responsible for clients including HSBC Bank and American Express. Mr. DiRug-giero joined Paramount Group in 2001 as vice president of property management, and is responsible for all aspects of prop-erty management operations and secu-rity for the current portfolio of 12 million square feet, in New York, Washington and San Francisco. Mr. DiRuggiero es-tablished Paramount’s San Francisco presence and is responsible for leasing in that market.

Lindenbaum, Greenbaum, Knakal, DiRuggiero and Korren snag top honors

The 2010 Real Estate Board of New York Honorees

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OP-ED


I was sincerely humbled to learn that I was going to be this year’s recipient of the Real Estate

Board of New York’s Louis Smad-beck Broker Recognition Award. I’m extraordinarily appreciative to REBNY, Steve Spinola, Bill Mon-tana and the commercial board of directors for this honor—and to everyone who has, even tangen-tially, been a part of this wonder-ful ride.

Probably the nicest thing about being notified that I would receive this award is that it made me take a step back and consider the whole history of my career. And when I did that, I imme-diately started thinking of all the people who’ve helped me along the way, without whom I would never have been consid-ered for this recognition.

My first serious expo-sure to the real estate in-dustry took place by acci-dent, during spring break of my freshman year at the Wharton School, in 1981, when I, along with just about every oth-er Wharton kid, wanted to be the next hot shot to take over Wall Street. I wanted a summer job that would look good on my résumé, so I applied at every commercial bank and investment bank I saw in Ber-gen County (which is where I grew up). I walked out of a Paine Web-ber o!ce in Continental Plaza and, across the hall, I saw “Coldwell Banker.” I thought it was another bank, so I dropped my résumé o" there, too.

Just a few hours later, I received a phone call asking me to come in for an interview the next day. There was no Web in 1981, so I went to the library prior to the interview to do some research on this bank so that I’d be prepared. When I discovered that Coldwell Banker was a real es-tate company, I almost didn’t go to the interview. But I went, and it was the only company to o"er me summer employment, so I took the job somewhat reluctantly.

From my first day there, I loved it. It was an energetic environment with hardworking people making a lot of money and having a lot of fun. The result was three college summers working at CB. It was there that I developed friendships with two senior brokers who were willing to befriend a young, wide-

eyed kid. Jack Fatigati was always willing to answer any of the hun-dreds of questions I had, and Tom Mallaney taught me that, despite the commonly accepted rule, nice guys can finish first. I’m fortunate to count Jack and Tom among my good friends to this day, nearly 30 years later.

After graduating from Whar-ton, I decided to take a full-time position with CB in their

Manhattan o!ce. On my first day on the job, I met this other young guy named Paul Massey. He had

worked for CB in the same summer program, in Boston, and he’d also decided to give the build-ing sales business a go in the Big Apple. CB had about 50 o!ce leasing brokers in New York at the time, and four build-ing sales brokers, includ-ing Paul. The three other sales brokers each had about 20 years of expe-rience and wanted noth-ing to do with the young kids—so, on my second

day on the job, Paul and I formed a partnership that has lasted for 26 years and counting. Thousands of days and tens of thousands of conversations later, I can say that I have been so lucky to have a great business partner who has driven me to do better than my best every day. Thank you, Paul.

The CB years were so much fun. There was a group of us who all started together and went through the “start-up phase” of what was a very challenging but exciting busi-ness. Johnny Maher, Kevin Danehy, Paul Myers, Bob Stella, Bob Law, Kim Mogul, Jackie Mansfield and many others were all there with Paul and me, and we all fought to make our mark on the industry. Dinners often consisted of one pur-chased beer and the systematic dis-mantling of the free hors d’oeuvres bar at the Charley O’s in the ground floor of 437 Madison Avenue.

Paul and I closed our first transaction in March of 1985, a 20,000-square-foot commercial building located at 1421 Third Av-enue that almost burned down the night before the closing. But the building survived; the sale closed; and when we got back to the o!ce, our mentor, Gerry Bridges, was happy to take “the rookies” to a

grand dinner at Smith & Wollensky. Gerry was a 50-year veteran of CB who could not have been nicer to us. Unfortunately, he passed away last year, but Paul and I will always remember his kindness to us in our formative years. In two weeks, our firm will present the 21st annual Gerald W. Bridges Salesman of the Year Award to our top agent.

In the early days of prospecting, I was fortunate to stumble upon Louis Brause, who owned two prop-erties in the territory I was cover-ing. In my first cold call to him, I ex-plained that I wanted to meet with him to discuss what Paul and I were up to in our new division at Cold-well. Lou suggested a meeting at his o!ce at 52 Vanderbilt Avenue. I said, “Vanderbilt Avenue? Where’s that?” I can just imagine what kind of second thoughts that response must have given him. Fortunately for Paul and me, Lou kept the meet-ing and became a great friend to us.

Another of our company awards is named in his honor, recognizing all of the guidance he provided.

As our careers progressed, Paul and I became aware of the Real Es-tate Board of New York and the tre-mendous work it does on behalf of our industry. In the mid-1980s, we both set the goal of becoming members of REBNY’s Sales Brokers Committee—and after months of harassing Jack Hill, who oversaw the committee in those days, we finally did. It was on that commit-tee that we made several of the relationships that we still cherish to this day. The comradely nature of the sales brokerage business in New York would surprise many people. Among our competitors, we’ve met a lot of people whom

we regard very highly and consid-er our good friends. In addition to many others, these include Darcy Stacom and Bill Shanahan at CB Richard Ellis; Ron Cohen, Richard Baxter, Scott Latham and Jon Ca-plan at Cushman & Wakefield; Pe-ter Hauspurg and Brian Ezratty at Eastern Consolidated; and Woody Heller at Studley. They are all the finest of professionals and among the nicest people you could meet.

Other brokers have helped me in many ways. Mary Ann Tighe has been an inspirational leader in our industry and I congratulate her on becoming the first woman to chair REBNY. Steve Siegel is my real es-tate big brother who has always been there with the right advice at just the right time, and I could never forget one of the first bro-kers I co-brokered a sale with, Sid-ney Rosenthal, who taught me a lot about what being a sales broker was all about.

I’m especially honored and flat-tered when I note that this award puts me in the company of so many legendary brokers whom I respect and admire, including Steve Sie-gel, Ray O’Keefe, Dan Gronich, Stephen Riker, Ben Fox, Mary Ann Tighe, Eugene Hegy, Bruce Mos-ler, Earl Atlman and my partner, Paul Massey, who was the recipi-ent three years ago. This recog-nition is particularly meaningful to me as Lou Smadbeck was one of those early members of the Sales Brokers Committee whom I learned so much from. He was gra-cious enough to send Paul and me a kind letter in November of 1988, congratulating us on the opening of our firm. That letter, and a photo of Lou, hangs in the reception area of our Manhattan o!ce.

I can also think of so many clients to whom I owe so much. I apol-ogize to each of you for not be-

ing able to mention you all here by name. I must, however, acknowl-edge a few. I’ll be forever grateful to Harry Macklowe for allowing me to represent him in several transac-tions, including the sale of his mul-tifamily portfolio, one of the most rewarding transactions I’ve ever worked on. Before Ofer Yardeni be-came the maverick investor that he is today, he was a sales broker, and we completed the sale of a prop-erty on West 28th Street together in the early 1990s. I’m honored to count him as one of my clients to-

day, having sold many properties for him over the years.

Gary Barnett and Dov Hertz con-tinue to impress me with their in-sightful knowledge and straight-forward approach. Seventeen years of transactions later, I remain ap-preciative of what they’ve done for me. Frank Patafio, Russ Appel and Joel Wiener continue to show con-fidence in me year after year, and I’m very grateful. Joe Sitt has been consistently great to work with, and Andy Davido" has not only been a wonderful client but has be-come a valued friend.

But no matter how small the transaction, without the confi-dence and trust of each client, a track record cannot grow. There-fore, I’m extraordinarily thankful to each and every client with whom I’ve ever worked.

The many past and present members of my Massey Knakal family have had a huge hand in that track record—from all of my partners, including John Ciraulo, Tom Donovan, James Nelson, Shi-mon Shkury, Christy Moyle, and Mike Wlody; to our management team, including Gia LaMarca, Kyle Mast and Ken Krasnow; to each broker; to our part-time interns. My personal team members, Jon Hageman, Elysa Berlin, Tom Wil-loughby, Kevin Gleason and Greg Postyn, and my personal assistant, Erin Mitchell, are second to none in terms of supporting my e"orts. Past team members include Danny Hagan, Mike Desjadon, Mike So-leimani, David Kalish, Casey Mc-Cormack, J.J. Stanton, Meyrick Ferguson, Michael Decheser, Peter DeCheser and James Nelson, who is not only a partner but is a top producer at the firm.

All I can say is thank you to all of you, mentioned here or not, who have participated in transac-tions with me. This is a business in which success cannot be attained without significant help. I’ve been very lucky to have had so many wonderful people to enjoy this in-credible job with, and also lucky to have accidentally found a vocation I love so much.

[email protected]

Robert Knakal is the chairman and founding partner of Massey Knakal Realty Services, and has brokered the sale of more than 1,050 proper-ties in his career.

This REBNY honoree has many to thank for success in his accidental vocation

A Thank-You Note

There was no Web in 1981, so I went to the library prior to the interview to do some research on this bank so that I’d be prepared. When I discovered that Coldwell Banker was a real estate company, I almost didn’t go to the interview.

CONCRETE THOUGHTS

Robert KnakalColumnist


TENANT RSF REPRESENTATIVE BROKER

200 West 57th Street57 Wellness Beauty 1,783 Fuminori YokoyamaBette Bruam, LCSW, PC 930 Jeff Buslik Adams & CompanyDr. Christian Chung, DDS 2,210 Kat Hwang Rice & Associates, LLCHudson Pilot, LLC 1,350 Ira Fishman ID Real Estate Partners, LLCImmuno Health NY, LLC 982 April Summars City ConnectionsJonathan Moldover, MD, LLC 2,039 Joshua Goldman Cushman & Wakefield, Inc.Leonard Rubin, MD 878 David Amsterdam Cushman & Wakefield, Inc.

140 West 57th StreetEuro-Center USA, Inc. 3,461 Brian Siegel The Lawrence GroupMadison One, LLC 3,256 Ken Fishel Legacy Real Estate

488 Madison AvenueAlzeon Holdings 3,743 Jay Futersak Dakota RealtyCrowe Horwath 26,827 Paul Haskin CB Richard EllisGerber Finance 4,925 Rob Silver Newmark Knight FrankKarpas Strategies 1,181 Arthur Delmhorst Delmhorst & Sheehan, Inc.Pustorino, Puglisi & Co. 13,081 Michael Burgio Cushman & Wakefield, Inc.

Michael GambinoXerox 4,528 Doug Neye Jones Lang LaSalle

570 Lexington AvenueArcher Capital 3,970 Sinclair Li CB Richard EllisCarrera Willowbridge 4,205 Joel Burris Brown Harris StevensThe Finsbury Group 7,080 Sacha Zarba CB Richard EllisLevien & Company 893 Alan Grossman ARG RealtyMarex Financial 3,970 Adam Schultz CB Richard EllisMiller & Wrubel 8,598 Audrey Novoa Murray Hill PropertiesModern Realty, Inc. 2,772 Cory Borg Newmark Knight FrankNatanold Management Corp. 1,743 Jared Freede First Service WilliamsThe Real Estate Board of 24,213 Sacha Zarba CB Richard Ellis

New York Lauren CrowleyZiegler, Ziegler & Associates 3,970 David Berke Cushman & Wakefield, Inc.

Fred F. French Building (551 Fifth Avenue)

Savin Diamond Corp. 2,320 Jonathan B. Fein Cushman & Wakefield, Inc.Jack Cohen

Simon & Partners, LLP 5,510 Eric Zemachson Newmark Knight FrankChris Mongeluzo

145 West 30th StreetAmalgamated, LLC 8,101 Andrew Beckler Feld Real EstateNew Age Training 8,101 David Menaged Intrepid Real Estate Group

Michael Chera

261 Fifth AvenueBabine Lake 8,575 Richard Phlen, Seth Hecht First Service WilliamsDWI Holdings Inc. 13,678 Michael Norris Colliers ABRRaxon Fabrics 8,437 Rob Silver, Neil Rubin Newmark Knight Frank

TENANT RSF REPRESENTATIVE BROKER

Seven Penn Plaza (370 Seventh Avenue)

Goldstick, Weinberger, 4,509 Simeon Weber Norman Bobrow & Co.Feldman & Grossman

Sinel & Associates, Esq. 3,751 Michael Kaufman Kaufman OrganizationTarlow & Company CPA’s 7,795 William Berkis, Jr. Winoker RealtyWounded Warrior 4,366 Brian Hay CB Richard Ellis

250 Park Avenue SouthBlue Tee Corp. 6,541 James Searl, Ross Eisenberg CBREHay House 2,633 Elliot Warren Kaufman OrganizationMadison Trading 11,683 Daniel Madison Newmark Knight Frank

Joshua Friedman

257 Park Avenue SouthBluestone Residential 4,726 Jamie Covello Cushman & Wakefield, Inc.

Management Nicholas WeldM. Moser Architects 6,620 Randy Abend, Ken Siegel Jones Lang LaSalle

853 Broadway BP Reprographics 7,687 Nathan Hale Mohr Partners Dr. Edward Gorecki & 1,416 Allan Gallaway Kurland Realty

Howard SchisslerHL Group 7,381 Bret Varricchio Hunter Realty OrganizationMake Up For Ever, LLC 7,686 Jamie Katcher, Don Preate Cushman & Wakefield, Inc.Momofuku Holdings 1,516 Rafe Evans Walker Milloy

Queens Atrium (30-20 Thomson Avenue), Long Island CityCity University of New York 167,309 Barry Rosner Newmark Knight Frank

2001 Marcus Avenue Lake Success

Allergy & Asthma Care of 1,615 Frank Pagano Corporate National RealtyNassau & Suffolk Dan Wiener

Carillo & Kober CPAs 1,167 Jeff Cebula Sutton & EdwardsCity Underwriting 10,295 Gus Nuzzolese Sutton & EdwardsHorowitz & Tanenbaum 3,536 Michael DiDonato Navigator Consulting GroupInVitro Sciences 3,099 Jeff Cebula Sutton & EdwardsPerry J. Milman, MD PC 4,133 Richard Someck Sutton & EdwardsSaft America 2,963 Jeff Cebula Sutton & Edwards

100 Quentin Roosevelt Boulevard Garden City

EuroNext Asset Management, LP 782 Neil Creedon Sutton & EdwardsSuite Space, LLC 2,990 Michael D. Ventre Windsor CommercialViraj USA, Inc. 1,391 Neil Creedon Sutton & Edwards

3601 Hempstead Turnpike Levittown

Bernhardi Corghill 2,525 Christopher Stack CBREMichael Corrigan, LLC 2,097 Vincent LaManna, Richard Freel CBREPremier Merchant Processing 1,899 Neil Creedon Sutton & EdwardsSystem Management 1,519 Vincent LaManna CBRE

Richard Freel

FEIL 2009 LEASE TRANSACTIONS

Seven Penn Plaza, New York, NY 10001 T 212 563 6557 F 212 563 6657 www.feilorg.com

Nothing Beats 50 Years of Stability.

The Feil Organization would like to express our gratitude to the brokers who helped make 2009 successful!


BY JOTHAM SEDERSTROM

The Commercial Observer: Congratulations on becoming chairwoman for the Real Estate Board of New York. What will be your first order of business as chairwoman?

Ms. Tighe: Last week, I met with the executive committee of REB-NY. In the last quarter of 2009, I joked that I went on a listening tour, where I met with as many members as I could of the board of governors and the executive committee and as many of the past chairmen as were able to find time to meet. [REBNY president] Steve Spinola, his sta! and myself put together priorities for REBNY to focus on in 2010. We talked to the executive committee and got their sign-o! on those pri-orities, and we’ve begun to organize ourselves around those priorities.

And what are those priorities? We put together a collection of

priorities that really are aimed not only at real estate but also at things we believe are critical for the well-being of the city. The first priority is to advocate for programs that in-centivize job creation and reten-tion in New York City, and we’re ac-tually making a specific proposal, which our economic development committee has put together for the [Economic Development Corpora-tion], for tax credits related to peo-ple who are bringing new employees to the city. The second priority is to advocate for fiscal discipline at the city and state level. The third prior-ity is to work with all relevant par-ties to encourage the development of a!ordable housing. The fourth is to advocate for a better and stronger Buildings Department.

We think they’ve done a great job on dealing with security at construc-tion sites, but, meanwhile, there are a number of hurdles that need to be overcome in terms of making the management side of the operation flow better so we can be ready for the next construction cycle. Also, we’re concerned because the unem-ployment rate among the construc-tion trades is 25 percent in the city right now, and there are over 500 projects that are stopped; so we want to work, in general, with the city to try to deal with unemploy-ment in the trades as well as some of the jobs that are troubled.

Another priority is that we want to seek more federal infrastructure dollars because New York City has not gotten its fair share.

We want to support immigration reform, and, finally, we want to en-courage everyone to participate in the 2010 census.

Looking inward, do you have a cohesive vision for REBNY?

REBNY’s structure is a strong and very healthy structure. I think if there was any area of focus, it’s that we want to continue to expand the membership. We’re 12,000 strong now, but we want to bring in more young members.

You mentioned the Buildings Department. With REBNY being such a powerful lobby, I’d love to hear your opinion of Mayor Bloomberg.

There’s no o"cial REBNY stance on the mayor, except to say that the city has flourished under his lead-ership and that in this very di"cult economic time for the city, we all feel blessed that such a skilled business-man and manager is at the helm. So I think we can only feel very positive that he’s leading us these next four years.

Take o! your REBNY hat. What’s your personal opinion about Bloomberg?

I personally believe everything I just said. This is a case where there’s just a period of stress on a lot of the di!erent systems in the city, and it is

a very happy thing to wake up in the morning and know crime is down in New York. It’s a wonderful thing to realize that there are fewer deaths in the Fire Department. And it’s won-derful to know he’s continuing to fight the good fight for the schools of the city, and our role at REBNY is to make sure the physical environment keeps up with his grand vision.

You’re the first woman to be elected chairman in REBNY’s 113-year history. Is that shock-ing to you? Is it a significant benchmark in your mind?

It means a great deal to me, but I can’t say that I’m shocked, because our industry has tended to be slow to change. I think that’s probably the best way to describe it. I think it’s only within the last 20 years or so that you’re beginning to see the fe-male membership of the Real Estate Board growing significantly. I don’t mean that historically there haven’t been important women in New York real estate—because there are many of them—but they have been iso-lated cases. The good news now is, there have been a number of women in our industry who would qualify to be chairman of the Real Estate Board, and what’s nice is that the executive committee and our president, Steve Spinola, has decided it was time to recognize somebody. But, believe me, there are several others who could just as well be in my role.

You’ve been hailed as one of the most influential women in New York City by the New York Post. Do you agree with that state-ment?

If it means having the ability to get things done—that you can envision something and get it done—than I’d like to think yes, that that’s the case. There are a few things I’ve managed to get done that make me feel like I can have some impact on our city.

Can you name one of them?I think you can look at two tow-

ers that are standing that I don’t think anybody would’ve bet on. The Condé Nast at Four Times Square, which was the first new construc-tion in a decade and the first build-ing at Times Square. As you probably know, it was a project that was held up for more than two decades. And then, of course, there was the New York Times building at a site that

I don’t think most people thought was coming into development any-time soon.

You were honored with a ‘Life-time Achievement’ award by REBNY at its award ceremony. That must be a little weird, right?

You know, I suddenly thought to myself, ‘Oh my! Am I that old?’ On the other hand, that night was so fun. I always joke that 25 years ago, I was so intimidated by the event, and now it seems like I’m going to a family wedding. I mean, it has that kind of festive feeling for me, so the award just added to that.

In a previous life, you worked at ABC, where you helped to create the A&E network. What do you think of A&E these days? Are you watching it?

I love A&E. One of the things that gave me great pride … I can still en-vision the moment, on a yellow le-gal pad, I wrote down ‘Arts & Enter-tainment’ and then crossed out the letters, and it’s hard to believe that myself and a dear friend, Liz Oliver, could be sitting at the garage she rented in East Hampton in 1981, and then, lo and behold, all these years later A&E is part of the viewing land-scape.

Have you watched The Jack-sons: A Family Dynasty yet?

[laughs] I haven’t. I have to ad-mit. Though I must admit I’m on the channel all the time, but I haven’t

gotten to that. [laughs] I’m sure I would enjoy it, though.

Let’s shift from the Jacksons and go back to real estate. What’s your outlook for 2010?

I think we’re already in the pro-cess of seeing an uptick. In the leas-ing market in Manhattan, we’re seeing an increase in activity. The five-year rolling average in midtown leasing, just to give one statistic, is 1.2 million square feet per month. We were under that number until June, when we broke through the million-square-foot mark. With the exception of one month, we’ve been up every month. In December, we did 1.6 million square feet of leas-ing in midtown. Every single market all had their availability rate drop—not hugely, but at least 10 or 20 ba-sis points for each one. In addition, I think most of them had positive ab-sorption, if not all of them.

What’s happened is very simple: We now have enough volume to es-tablish where pricing is. Once you’ve established pricing, people feel con-fident they can transact.

[email protected]

CB Richard Ellis’ Mary Ann Tighe on REBNY 2010, recent leases and Mayor Bloomberg

Madame Chair

‘[W]e’re concerned because the unemployment rate among the construction trades is 25 percent in the city right now and there are over 500 projects that are stopped; so we want to work, in general, with the city to try to deal with unemploy-ment in the trades as well as some of the jobs that are troubled.’

Earlier this month, legendary CB Rich-ard Ellis tristate chief executive Mary Ann Tighe o!cially moved into her new role as chairwoman of the power-ful Real Estate Board of New York. The Commercial Observer spoke to Ms. Tighe last week about her place in real estate history, the city’s revitalization and her priorities for REBNY.

THE SIT-DOWN


SJP Properties 212.344.6364

CBRE 212.984.8350

ELEVEN TIMES SQUARESUMMER 2010


POWER BROKER: TODD KORREN


At one time or another during his 25-year career, Todd Ko-rren has donned nearly ev-

ery hat that can be worn in the real estate industry. But whether he’s served as a leasing agent, property manager, developer or acquisitions pro, one puzzle the Swig Equities se-nior vice president has yet to solve is the one he is reminded of each time he returns to his William Street of-fice: How do you keep Lower Man-hattan desirable for potential ten-ants?

Indeed, as a member of the Real Estate Board of New York’s Down-town Rental Conditions Committee

and of a subcommittee focused on drawing new tenants to Lower Man-hattan, Mr. Korren has emerged as one of the area’s most committed advocates.

“We’re trying to figure out how to make downtown more competitive,” said Mr. Korren during an interview at his o!ce at 110 William, one of the downtown properties Swig op-erates. “The question is, how do we lure tenants downtown, and how do we improve retail conditions and en-courage them to come down here?”

Mr. Korren is nothing if not pas-sionate about Lower Manhattan, where the Roslyn, N.Y., resident first got his start in the real estate indus-try. As a college student at New York University, Mr. Korren worked for Rockrose Development, a job that allowed the young upstart to play a

role in luring people to Battery Park City in the late 1980s, back when the area was in its earliest development phase and not yet the vibrant com-munity it is today.

“Back then, there was literally one building, for all intents and pur-poses,” recalled Mr. Korren. As for how di!cult it was to lure tenants and residents to the area, Mr. Kor-ren said it was no walk in the park. “Especially in the winter, when it was very cold and there weren’t a lot of attractions. That was before the movie theater was there and before you had other buildings. Taxicabs weren’t even coming over there yet. It was very inconvenient.”

Since then, Mr. Korren has em-barked on a career that o"ers a pan-oramic view of the real estate indus-try. From positions at construction management company Structure Tone to the mechanical and elec-trical contractor EMCOR Group, he has learned the business by work-ing from the ground up and has of-ten followed a project from concept to completion.

“I’ve always felt that the best way to sell a product is by really under-standing the product and to sell it from a position of confidence,” said Mr. Korren, 45, who has been mar-ried for 20 years to his wife, Donna, and has two young daughters. “The best way to sell from a position of confidence is having knowledge. I’m very interested in learning, and I’ve always been somebody who’s con-tinued to learn during my career.”

In total, he has negotiated more than 830 leases represent-ing over 5 million square feet

of property during stints at such companies as the Witko" Group and Rockrose Development, where he returned as a managing direc-tor in 2001. He also played a role in more than 20 acquisitions, with a combined value in excess of $1.2 billion, he said.

Last year, Mr. Korren and Swig Equities—where he has operated since 2004—completed capital-im-provement projects at all seven of the company’s Lower Manhattan properties, including lobby and fa-cade renovations at buildings such as 110 Williams Street and 90 Broad Street.

The capital-improvement proj-ects were made easier thanks to a de-cision by Kent Swig in 2007 to take a break from acquiring new projects

and instead to move to refinance Swig’s existing assets—a strategy that turned out to be prescient, said Mr. Korren.

“This was before you had the sub-prime crises,” Mr. Korren recalled. “Kent realized we needed to stop and get the properties leased up and sta-bilized so we could refinance them, and we did have a concern that there was going to be some sort of credit-induced crises that would a"ect our ability to refinance our properties over the next 24 months.”

But what Mr. Korren appears to be most passionate about these days is his work in Lower Manhattan and his e"orts to draw new tenants to

the area. Although many questions about construction at the World Trade Center have yet to be an-swered, Mr. Korren said that delays have not kept people from flocking to other areas of Lower Manhattan below Canal Street.

“What’s an interesting fact—and something I like to tell people—is that downtown Manhattan, exclud-ing Tribeca, has the fastest-growing residential population within all five boroughs,” he said. “The fastest-growing residential population! It’s literally doubling since 2000. And that’s absolutely amazing.”

Mr. Korren said that he expects to announce what may be the larg-

est transaction of the year within several weeks, when an undisclosed tenant signs a 120,000-foot lease at 110 William. But Mr. Korren, who is bullish on Lower Manhattan, sug-gested that the deal could be the first of many for Swig and its portfolio of downtown properties this year.

“Where the uncertainty still re-mains is the access to the subways, whether it be the Calatrava station or when the PATH station will be fin-ished,” he said. “Those are really the questions people would like to have answered. But as those dates start to get firmly finalized, you’ll see people start to move back down here.”

[email protected]

REBNY honoree and Swig ace focuses on luring tenants to Lower Manhattan

The Downtowner

Mr. Korren said that he ex-pects to announce what may be the largest transaction of the year within several weeks, when an undisclosed tenant signs a 120,000-foot lease at 110 William. But Mr. Korren, who is bullish on Lower Manhattan, suggest-ed that the deal could be the first of many for Swig and its portfolio of downtown properties this year.

Todd Korren joined Swig Equities in 2004, after stints with the Witko! Group and Rockrose Development, among others.

JB R

EED


MIDTOWN

RUDIN MANAGEMENT COMPANYThanks The Following Tenants And BrokersFor Making 2009 Another Successful Year

DOWNTOWN

345 PARK AVENUE, NEW YORK, NY 10154 212.407.2400 www.rudin.com

345 Park AvenueWafra Investment Advisory Group, Inc.

Brian Gell & Clyde Reetz of CB Richard Ellis Inc.Loeb & Loeb LLP

Brian Gell, Lewis Miller & Kenneth Rapp of CB Richard Ellis Inc.

355 Lexington AvenueAmba Research USA Inc.

Energy Group Inc.CAI Benefits, Inc.

Daniel Horowitz & Jeffrey Peck of Studley, Inc.The Harry Walker Agency Inc.

Harry Blair of FirstService WilliamsGotham Equity Partners, L.P.

Jason Greenstein of Newmark Knight Frank

641 Lexington AvenueKomodo Holding Company

FedEX Office & Print ServicesBVA New York Limited

Gui Tepedino of CitySites Commercial Group, LLCTheodore Williams Construction Company, LLC

TM Capital Corp.Joseph F. Harkins & Sean Fay of Grubb & Ellis New York Inc.

Andrew M. Lawler, P.C.

560 Lexington AvenueCarlton Advisory Services

Anthony Dattoma of CB Richard Ellis Inc.

845 Third AvenueSwimkef Corp.

Norman Bobrow of Norman Bobrow & Co.Corrao Miller Rush & Wiesenthal Legal

Search Consultants Inc.Corey Abdo of Winoker Realty

Howard W. Segal, P.C.Blaqwell, Inc.

Titan Capital, LLCGallet & Dreyer & Berkey, LLPNorthstar Capital Funds, LLC

136 East 55th StreetCapital One, N.A.

415 Madison AvenueSharp Communications, Inc.

Gordon Ogden & Thomas Murray of Byrnam Wood, LLC

41 Madison AvenueYamazaki Tableware Inc

Nambe Mills Inc.Waechtersbach USA, Incorporated

WWRD US, LLCBormioli Rocco Glass Co., Inc.

L!ObjectReed & Barton Corporation

CAC Sales, Inc.Gibson Overseas, Inc.

Seguso Viro USA Corp.Fitz & Floyd Enterprises LLC

Noritake Co. Inc.Martin!s Herend Imports, Inc.

Home Etc.Pasabache USA Inc.

C.C.A. International, Inc.Prouna

Robinson Home ProductsMichael Wainwright Inc.

Rogaska CrystalLenox Corporation

AGS Benefits Group, LLCKevin P. Daly of Cushman & Wakefield

Serving New York’s Real Estate Needs With Distinction for Over 100 Years

80 Pine StreetGoldstein Goldstein Rikon & Gottlieb, P.C.

Beranbaum Menken LLPJoshua Goldman of Cushman & Wakefield

Waypoint Capital Management, LLCElie Reiss of Tungsten Properties

1 Whitehall Street

Nationwide Mutual Insurance CompanyJohn T. Pavone of CB Richard Ellis Inc.

Frenkel Lambert Weiss Weisman & Gordon, LLPArora & Associates, P.C.

Peter E. Sabesan of HunterRealty Organization, LLCMixit, Inc.

Choice Logistics, Inc.David Hollander of CB Richard Ellis Inc.

110 Wall StreetHarvey Gladstein & Partners LLC

Richard Schlesinger of R.B. Schlesinger & Co.McLane Capital Partners LLC

Unifi Communications Inc.John Baumann & Bernard Weinstable

of Cushman & WakefieldForex Signs, Inc.

1 Battery Park PlazaThe Partnership for New York City, Inc.

Hal Stein of Newmark Knight Frank

55 Broad StreetAlign Communications, Inc.

onTargetjobs LLCRyan McKinney of Studley, Inc.

Woodmere Trading LLCWilliam Berkis, Jr. of Winoker Realty

M.J. Green & Associates LLCSavvas Koudellou of NYC Connections

Pilosoft, Inc.RCN New York Communications LLCPaul Formichelli of Jones Lang LaSalle

Independent Brokers LLCManhattan Medical Offices Management, Inc.

Alliance for Downtown New York, Inc.Nuance Communications, Inc.

Michael Morris of Newmark Knight FrankadMarketplace Inc.

Internet Information Delivery Corp.Lisa Holyfield of Concrete Stories LLC

Getco, LLC


BY EMILY GEMINDER

Building tops in downtown Man-hattan o!er little in the way of eye-catching spectacle—imag-

ine, for a minute, that you’re staring down, not up, at one of those gar-gantuan fortresses of steel—and 77 Water Street is not a structure that readily distinguishes itself from its Financial District cohorts. It’s an oversize air-conditioner of a build-ing, vents running like industrial gills up its sides, roughly the color of an old computer monitor.

But if you could manage a glimpse from above, you’d see its airplane.

For the past four decades, a World War I Sopwith Camel fighter has sat idling on a long green runway atop the building’s roof. A source of amused curiosity for the denizens of overlooking skyscrapers (as well as some initial trouble with the Federal Aviation Administration), the life-size model airplane has otherwise maintained something of a nonexis-tent existence. Not open to the pub-lic, invisible from the street below, it sits at the edge of its runway eter-nally poised for flight.

In March of 2008, Goldman Sachs put 77 Water Street on the mar-ket. It had leased the entire near-ly 600,000-square-foot building in 2000—one of several ancillary o"ce buildings it rented in the neighbor-hood of its Broad Street headquar-ters. That was at the height of the 1990s dot-com boom, when projec-tions indicated the firm’s workforce could expand to as many as 30,000 employees within a decade. It was also the year that the boom went bust, and Goldman never moved in.

Now after close to a decade, as the

firm relocates its headquarters to the new 200 West Street, Goldman is finally closing several major deals in the building it never actually oc-cupied. AT&T will take the largest plot at 100,000 square feet, followed by law firm Lewis Brisbois Bisgaard & Smith, UnitedHealthcare and One-Beacon Insurance Group. The rents were around $35 a square foot, ac-cording to Crain’s, with generous building allowances.

For a firm that trades largely in in-visible things, especially if that firm holds secrecy as a governing cove-nant, real estate can sometimes o!er a singularly corporeal history: gam-bles and doubling-backs, an artful dodge of a broader economic trajec-tory here, a negotiation of a political one there, all spelled out in concrete and stone. Between a roughly $40 billion government bailout, payout on its AIG debt, prodigious bonus-es and the recent revelation that Goldman bet heavily against the very mortgage-related securities it peddled, it’s not surprising that an empty building in the Financial Dis-trict has received little scrutiny. But the history of Goldman at 77 Water Street—a non-history, really, since it was never actually there—is an odd glimpse into the famously guarded company.

In the 1960s, Melvyn Kaufman, the developer of 77 Water Street, acquired a reputation as some-

thing of a maverick, an iconoclast—a rogue developer, if you will. It’s a reputation he earned not so much for his buildings themselves—numbingly banal boxes engorged to block-swallowing hulk—but for his attitude toward them. “Every build-ing is an obscenity,” he once said. “I think every building carries with it an obligation that from the moment you begin to the day you die, you must apologize.”

It’s di"cult to imagine many de-velopers today apologizing for their buildings, even when the obsceni-ties of those buildings are mark-edly apparent to the rest of us. But Mr. Kaufman did more than apolo-gize. He constructed physical incar-nations of his apologies from metal and stone. He commissioned art ob-jects and whimsical public spaces in and around his obscenities, as if to cushion the blow. The result was a curious dynamic: mini-carnivals en-cased in glass-and-travertine tombs. On Third Avenue, Mr. Kaufman in-stalled a giant game of chess. At 127 John Street, he commissioned Ru-dolph de Harak to create a neon-lit, corrugated-metal tunnel for an en-

tranceway and a three-story digital clock. The American Institute of Ar-chitecture called it “a no-nonsense building with a happy nonsense-filled lobby and sidewalk.”

At 26 stories, the bland and eco-nomical 77 Water Street was com-pleted in 1970 with Mr. Kaufman and his brother Robert at the helm. The plans were drawn up by the ar-chitects at Emery Roth & Sons, a firm better known for its ability to maximize net rentable area than for its commitment to aesthetics. But this building, too, had its swaths of happy nonsense. A series of ponds meandered through the public pla-za, traversed by small footbridg-es and filled with streambed rocks and jumping metal fish. Heat lamps were shaped like trees and seats like mushrooms. Hyper-modern sculp-tures were installed here and there, and in an unlikely final touch, an old-fashioned candy store was thrown in, too.

Mr. Kaufman, an admirer of Walt Disney, said of his building philos-ophy, “The Disney policy, simply stated, is to transmit pleasure and well-being to the public.” Critics, meanwhile, were divided on wheth-er Mr. Kaufman’s antics amount-ed to cartoonish afterthoughts or transformative amalgams of enter-tainment and urbanism. New 1961 zoning law incentives for including

public spaces in new buildings likely deserved some credit also, although it must be said, few other plazas had the Kaufman flair for theater.

The 1961 zoning laws rung in an era of breakneck, breathless devel-opment, encouraging the sort of frenzied tower erecting that the pa-renthesis about plazas was meant to address, however feebly. New York, it’s often said, is not defined by any coalescing urban vision but by a riot of competing visions, endless-ly writing and rewriting each other out of existence. It’s also true, how-ever, that commercial enterprise has always been at the heart of the city’s architectural schemes, all but etched into its blueprints. The 1961 zoning laws just opened the doors a little wider.

At 77 Water Street, with high-roll-er tenants like IBM, European Amer-ican Bank and Walston & Co., the Kaufmans fell squarely into the com-peting visions of their day. The build-ing is a testimony to the calculus of extracting every last square foot of profit from a space, but it also says something about architecture’s po-tential for whimsy. “You make a zil-lion dollars from a job and you plunk it down in the middle of a block,” Mr. Kaufman once said. “You owe some-thing to the people for doing that, even if it’s just a place to sit.”

Why did Goldman wait eight years to even put 77 Water Street up for lease? Clearly, it

wasn’t waiting for a favorable mar-ket. In some ways, the building was always something of an odd choice for Goldman, a firm with famously attention-deflecting preferences in o"ce space. The stultifying brown 85 Broad Street shows no signs of nonsense, happy or otherwise (at least, not in the architecture), and neither, at twice the size and rough-ly 14 times the cost, does the firm’s new headquarters (though the lobby will contain at least one $5 million painting).

In 2003, as Wall Street was shift-ing its speculative zeal to the hous-ing market, an article appeared in The Wall Street Journal concerning new regulations on how companies write o! their empty o"ce space. It used Goldman’s nearly vacant 77 Water Street as a case study. (Robert Kaufman and a Goldman spokesper-son both confirmed that the build-ing has remained largely empty throughout the past decade.) Citing the roughly $75 million charge, or 9 cents a share, Goldman would have been forced to incur for writing o! the building, the article speculated that large tenants were refraining from subleasing their space to avoid such a scenario, possibly accounting for millions of square feet of “shad-ow space” throughout the city. A Goldman spokesperson quoted in the article said the firm was not re-quired to write o! the space and that the rules allowed for “management judgment.”

Management judgment turned out to be a source of other debates at 77 Water Street. In 2004, Crain’s reported that the Kaufmans were threatening Goldman with potential litigation for improper maintenance. The public plaza had largely fallen into disrepair: Its trees were dying or dead, an escalator entranceway had been boarded up, pigeons were flying through the light fixtures. To be fair, Goldman said it had proposed renovations, and Melvyn Kaufman was never one to approach litigation timidly (he sued several neighbors in his high-end Westchester enclave as well as Mayor Giuliani). But it’s still unclear what Goldman had in mind for the empty space. In 2000, rather than subleasing from Reliance Insur-ance, which held a lease for 77 Water Street through 2014, Goldman made a direct, 20-year deal with the Kauf-mans. In return, it wanted to man-age the entire building. Goldman, it seemed, had serious plans for the real estate. So what changed?

Studiously economical, full of empty Goldman turf, now teeming with new leases

‘No-Nonsense’ and a Sopwith Camel

BUILDING STORIES: 77 Water Street

THE VITALSYear Built: 1970Landlord: Sage Realty Cor-poration

Square Footage:Building: 541,569 Office: 541,569 Lot: 25,779

Annual Tentative Tax Bill (2009/10):$3,411,545

City’s Tentative Net As-sessed Value (2009/10):$72,300,000

Source: PropertyShark.com

The 26-story 77 Water Street was designed by Emery Roth & Sons.


‘Every building is an obscenity. I think every building carries with it

an obligation that from the moment you begin to the day you die, you

must apologize.’ —Melvyn Kaufman

In the wake of Sept. 11, city and state o!-cials forecast a mass commercial migration from Lower Manhattan and dreamed up in-centives to convince companies to stay. Nev-er a company to walk away from free govern-ment money, Goldman sought $1 billion in tax-free Liberty Bonds and committed early

on to build its headquarters cater-cornered to the World Trade Center site. Goldman, after all, understood better than anyone that New York City would remain the sun of the finan-cial solar system, propelled by the millions of invisible transactions that turn the gears of capital enterprise.

Today, with empty real estate something of a national hallmark, Goldman is finally fill-ing its own. Though Robert Kaufman says the parties have settled their di"erences over the public plaza, the area has the definite look of

a shadow space. The ponds have been emp-tied of water and rocks, stranding their jump-ing metal fish midair. Gone too are the tree heat lamps, and the mezzanine is boarded up and uninhabited. A sculpture made of sever-al large metal blocks—including one hanging from overhead like a loose chunk of building—looks more convincing than was presumably intended.

The Kaufmans got their zillion dollars, but what did the public get? It’s true that if you really wanted to, you could still sit on one of the plaza’s concrete benches. But you could also sit on the curb if you really wanted to. If the public apologies at 77 Water Street have not fared well, at least the plane, that curi-ous anachronism atop a skyline of high-ris-es, is still intact. Though for whom exactly it was intended is not altogether clear—cer-tainly not for the public, who never saw it, or for the employees who had no access to the roof. Melvyn Kaufman once said of 77 Water Street that he’d wanted “to make the build-ing disappear. … The scale of any large o!ce building is impossible for a human being to relate to.”

But it was Goldman that really made the building disappear. It’s frequently the things beyond the scale of human imagining—com-plex financial derivatives, speculative bub-bles, shadow real estate—that turn into noth-ing suddenly. It’s just that most of us aren’t up high enough to catch the vanishing act.

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NEW YORK CITY

A Special Thank YouWe would like to thankour clients for making

2009 the best year ever forNAI Global New York City.

Even in this difficult market,we continue to grow andexpand, and look forward

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2010 INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT SERIES

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New York City’s Top 15 Commercial Mortgages of the 4Q 2009

Who’s Lending to Whom

FINANCING

3 East 101st Street $369,914,999 Mount Sinai School of Medicine of New York

Dormitory Authority of the State of New York

Two separate mortgage files were filed on three properties: 1474 Madison Avenue, 4-20 East 102 Street and 3 East 101 Street.

420 Lexington Avenue $145 million SLG Graybar New Ground Lessee LLC, part of SL Green

Teachers Insurance and Annuity Association of America Two separate mortgage files were filed.

550 Second Avenue $96,810,873 Kips Bay Development LP, DFD Develop-ment LP The Union Labor Life Insurance Company Five separate mortgage files were filed on the same day.

535 East 70th Street $79,308,000 New York Society for Relief of the Ruptured and Crippled


A mortgage was taken on two properties: 535 East 70th Street and 527 F.D.R. Drive.

525 East 70th Street $79,308,000 New York Society for Relief of the Ruptured and Crippled


51 West 53rd Street $70.4 million W2005/Hines West Fifty-Third Realty, LLC The Museum of Modern ArtA mortgage was taken on six properties: 55 West 53rd Street, 53 West 43rd Street, 51 West 53rd Street, 49 West 53rd Street, 44 West 54th Street and 48 West 54th Street.

515 Madison Avenue $70 million 515 Madison LLC (c/o Newmark Knight Frank) Wells Fargo Bank, National Association

697 Fifth Avenue $63 million GFC Fifth Avenue Owner LLC Safra National Bank of New York A mortgage was taken on two properties: 697 Fifth Avenue and a commercial condo unit at 2 East 55th Street.

1515 Broadway $50 million 1515 Broadway Fee Owner LLC, part of SL Green Bank of China, New York Branch

1299 Second Avenue $41,202,068 215 East 68th Street LP Prudential Multifamily Mortgage Apartment building with stores.

17 Battery Place, Unit 1 $40 million Ocean Prime LLC (c/o the Moinian Group) Metropolitan Life Insurance Company

166 Amsterdam Avenue $39,950,000 CCP Amsterdam I LLC (c/o American Continental Properties LLC) KBC Bank NV

105 East 17th Street $38.6 million 105 East 17th Street Associates LLC Rcg LV Debt IV Reit, LP

387 West 12th Street $37,545,071 383-391 W 12th LLC CSE Mortgage LLC Three separate mortgage documents were filed on two properties: 383 West 12th Street and 391 West 12 Street.

166 East 119th Street $30,870,000 East Harlem Lexington Housing Develop-ment

New York City Housing Development Corporation

A mortgage filed on nine properties in two separate documents. A third mort-gage document was filed on the same day with the exact mortgage amount as a previously filed one.

Address Amount Borrower Lender Special Notes

Compiled by Roland Li with data from PropertyShark.com

NOTES: Property classifications were as defined in the mortgage document; apartment buildings were included.


We’ve enhanced our small balance loan program in a way.

There has never been a better time to apply for a small commercialreal estate loan at Arbor. While other firms no longer offer theprogram, Arbor is more committed than ever. That’s because wehave been doing multifamily small balance loans for more than adecade and are a top Fannie Mae DUS® small loan lender. At Arbor,we take being your financial partner seriously and it shows.

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REDUCEDAPPLICATION FEEOF $4,500As well as a New StreamlinedApplication Form

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1- Million, to Millionin Certain Markets


LEASE BEAT Compiled by Emily Geminder

MANHATTAN Email information on new leases to Emily Geminder at [email protected]

622 Third Avenue 14,000 Minerals Technolo-gies

Cohen Brothers Realty Corpora-tion

Minerals Technologies signed an 11-year lease. FirstService Williams’ Robert D. Goodman and Seth Hecht represented Minerals Technologies. The landlord, Cohen Brothers Realty Corporation, was represented in-house by David Nevins.

205 Eighth Avenue 1,800 GNCFrancemen 205 LLC

GNC signed a 1,800-square-foot lease. Ariel Schuster and Greg Covey of Robert K. Futterman represented GNC in the transaction. Building ownership, Francemen 205 LLC, was represented in-house by Aaron Schwartz.

215 Park Avenue South 4,945 UNX LLC SL GreenUNX signed a seven-year lease. Howard J. Tenenbaum and Gary M. Rosen represented landlord SL Green.

100 Park Avenue 900Metropolitan Shoe Repair and Shoe Shine

SL Green Metropolitan Shoe Repair and Shoe Shine renewed its lease for 10 years. Peter Goldich of ATCO Property Service Cor-poration represented the tenant; Jeffrey D. Roseman of Newmark Knight Frank repped landlord SL Green.

317 Madison Avenue 504D’Espresso of 42nd Street, LLC SL Green

D’Espresso of 42nd Street signed a 10-year lease. Jeffrey D. Roseman of Newmark Knight Frank repped landlord SL Green.

420 Lexington Avenue 957Korea Health In-dustry Develop-ment Institute

SL GreenKorea Health Industry Development Institute signed a three-year lease. Marie Hammoudi of Own Manhattan repre-sented the tenant.

810 Seventh Avenue 125Metropolitan Fiber Systems of New York, Inc

SL Green Metropolitan Fiber Systems of New York renewed its lease for five years.

420 Lexington Avenue 2,016Clear Harbor Asset Management SL Green Clear Harbor Asset Management signed a three-year lease. Andrew Stein of Vicus Partners represented the tenant.

420 Lexington Avenue 1,237 KBK, Inc. SL Green KBK signed a three-year lease. Hiroshi Nagata of Sumitomo Real Estate Sales represented the tenant.

317 Madison Avenue 5,801Iron Mountain In-formation Manage-ment

SL GreenIron Mountain Information Management signed a five-year lease. John Moxley of Jones Lang LaSalle represented the tenant.

625 Madison Avenue 997 Macaron Café SL GreenMacaron Café signed a 10-year lease for a new eatery. Edward J. Reilly of Reilly Real Estate represented the tenant; Gregg Gropper of Newmark Knight Frank repped landlord SL Green.

625 Madison Avenue 6,150Lederer de Paris Fifth Avenue SL Green

Lederer de Paris Fifth Avenue signed a lease for 18 months. Jeffrey D. Roseman of Newmark Knight Frank repped land-lord SL Green.

420 Lexington Avenue 917Pias Intercosmex (U.S.A.) Corpora-tion

SL Green Pias Intercosmex signed a 917-square-foot lease.

19 West 44th Street 394 The Caldwell Group SL GreenThe Caldwell Group signed a three-year lease. Andrew Lazarus of Tudor Realty Services represented the tenant; Denise Rodriguez repped landlord SL Green in-house.

483 Broadway 40,000 Aurora Capital As-sociates

483 Broadway Re-alty Corp.

Aurora Capital Associates signed a 40,000-square-foot master lease spanning 49 years, a roughly $150 million deal. Aurora represented itself in the transaction. The building owner, 483 Broadway Realty Corp., was represented in-house by Bruce Kaye of AKB Realty Group.

3 West 56th Street 4,762 John Richmond Lexington Build-ing Co.

John Richmond signed a lease for 4,762 square feet. Building ownership, Lexington Building Co., was represented by Ariel Schuster and Izzy Anthony of Robert K. Futterman.

SQ. FEET TENANT LANDLORD


Behind every successful Building Owner there is a host of incredibly talented brokers

and steadfast tenants.Jack Resnick & Sons thanks the following firms and the brokers who represented them,

as well as our existing tenants who renewed their commitments to New York City in 2009.

Jack Resnick & SonsOwners and Builders Since 1928

110 East 59th Street New York, NY 10022

212-421-1300 www.resnicknyc.com

Proud to be a member of

The Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York

880 THIRD AVENUErepresented by:

Paul Wexler of Corcoran Wexler Healthcare Properties

H&R Block Eastern Tax Service, Inc.170 WEST 23RD STREET

Equitable Leasing Co. Inc.110 EAST 59TH STREET

Jaffe, Ross & Light, LLP880 THIRD AVENUE

23rd Street Spa Belle, Inc. 170 WEST 23RD STREET

represented by:Craig Slosberg of Newmark

Knight Frank Retail

Fisher, Harris, Shapiro, Inc.880 THIRD AVENUE

Empire Physical Therapy133 EAST 58TH STREET

Subway Real Estate Corp.170 WEST 23RD STREET

Braun & Goldberg110 EAST 59TH STREET

Hand Baldachin & Amburgey LLP8 WEST 40TH STREET

represented by:Joshua Goldman of Cushman & Wakefield

Hunter Global Investors, LLC485 MADISON AVENUE

represented by:Mike Norris of Colliers ABR

Brial Corporation133 EAST 58TH STREET

Jeffrey A. Scolnick133 EAST 58TH STREET

represented by:Jefferey P. Symmons of The Lawrence Group

Dr. Martin Kent133 EAST 58TH STREET

Stevens & Lee, P.C.485 MADISON AVENUE

represented by:Jane Roundell of CresaPartners

Aesthetique 2000133 EAST 58TH STREET

represented by:Daniel Katcher of Newmark Knight Frank

Coinmach401 EAST 80TH STREET

Staples the Office Superstore East, Inc.1755 BROADWAYrepresented by:

Chase Wells of Northwest Atlantic Real Estate Services, LLC

Adobe Systems, Inc.8 WEST 40TH STREET

represented by:John Lizzul of Newmark Knight Frank

Duchateau (U.S.) LTD.485 MADISON AVENUE

Dr. Ari Druz133 EAST 58TH STREET

Olympus U.S. Management, LLC485 MADISON AVENUE

represented by:Gary Greenspan & Eric LaCousiere of

Cushman & Wakefield, Inc.

Microdot LLC133 EAST 58TH STREET

John Lang, Inc.485 MADISON AVENUE

represented by:Jim Fredericks of Colliers ABR

Coinmach235 WEST 56TH STREET

Corbis Corporation250 HUDSON STREET

represented by:David A. Falk and David Levine

of Newmark Knight Frank

Jack Roth, DDS133 EAST 58TH STREET

TED Conferences, LLC250 HUDSON STREET

represented by:Kim Skarvelis and David Barreto

of Cast Iron Real Estate

Pace University161 WILLIAM STREET

represented by:David A. Falk of Newmark Knight Frank

DDG Partners LLC250 HUDSON STREET

Hudson Practice Management133 EAST 58TH STREET

Galaxy Lobby199 WATER STREET

Dr. David Molho133 EAST 58TH STREET


LEASE BEAT

MANHATTAN (continued)

800 Third Avenue 38,000 Levy Phillips & Konigsberg

n/a Levy Phillips & Konigsberg signed a long-term lease. Newmark Knight Frank’s Ronald E. Goldberger and Arthur Draznin represented the tenant; Richard Teichman of Joseph P. Day Realty Corp. represented the building owner.

1071 Sixth Avenue 3,368United Feather and Down

Ten Seventy One Associates

United Feather and Down signed a seven-year renewal. The asking rent was $44 a square foot. David Levy and Jeffrey Schwartz of Adams & Co represented both the tenant and landlord, Ten Seventy One Associates, in the transaction.

110 West 40th Street 3,491 Ilene DanchigOne Ten West For-tieth Associates

Ilene Danchig signed a five-year renewal. The asking rent was $38 a square foot. David Levy and Michael Greenberg of Adams & Co. represented both the tenant and landlord, One Ten West Fortieth Associates, in the transaction.

411 Fifth Avenue 1,485DMF Sales Com-pany

411 Fifth Avenue Associates

DMF Sales Company signed a lease renewal. The asking rent was $36 a square foot. David Levy of Adams & Co. repre-sented both the tenant and landlord, 411 Fifth Avenue Associates, in the transaction.

1071 Sixth Avenue 5,336David Geller Asso-ciates

Ten Seventy One Associates

David Geller Associates signed a three-year lease. The asking rent was $42 a square foot. David Levy and Jeffrey Schwartz of Adams & Co. represented both the tenant and landlord, Ten Seventy One Associates, in the transaction.

34 West 33rd Street 943 Pryorities NYArcade Building Associates

Pryorities NY signed a seven-year lease. The asking rent was $36 a square foot. David Levy and Brett Maslin of Adams & Co. represented both the tenant and landlord, Arcade Building Associates, in the transaction.

34 West 33rd Street 1,680 NY Kids Showroom Arcade Building Associates

NY Kids Showroom signed a three-year renewal. The asking rent was $36 a square foot. David Levy and Brett Maslin of Adams & Co. represented both the tenant and landlord, Arcade Building Associates, in the transaction.

48 West 37th Street 1,542 Exist Fashion Forty Eight Thirty Seven Associates

Exist Fashion signed a seven-year renewal. The asking rent was $95 a square foot. David Levy and Joey Friedman of Adams & Co. represented both the tenant and landlord, Forty Eight Thirty Seven Associates, in the transaction.

463 Seventh Avenue 2,159 G.F.B. FashionsThe Arsenal Com-pany

G.F.B. Fashions signed a three-year renewal. The asking rent was $36 a square foot. David Levy of Adams & Co. repre-sented both the landlord, the Arsenal Company, and the tenant in the transaction.

155 Fifth Avenue 5,097 Cosette n/a Cosette signed a five-year deal on the fourth floor. David Greene and Louis Pappas of Murray Hill Properties represent-ed the landlord.

4 New York Plaza 813,750 JPMorgan Chase The Harbor Group JPMorgan Chase will lease 75 percent of the 1.085 million–square–foot building from the Harbor Group for 15 years.

60 Broad Street 313,022Department of Pro-bation and Depart-ment of Homeless Services

Piedmont O!ce Realty Trust

The city’s Department of Probation and Department of Homeless Services renewed their leases for a combined 313,022 square feet. Jeff Kondrat of the Department of Citywide Administrative Services represented the city. Cog-swell Realty’s Arthur Stern, Anthony Stapleton, Eric Sarner, Ross Jacobs and Brian Ezra represented building owner Piedmont Office Realty Trust.

900 Eighth Avenue 1,300 Gourmet LTD The Moinian Group

Restaurant Gourmet signed a lease for 1,300 square feet. Winick Realty Group’s Darrell Rubens and Annie Shinn repre-sented both the tenant and the landlord.

225 Varick Street 1,500Hudson Square Mart

Trinity Real Es-tate Hudson Square Mart signed a 12-year lease.

79 East 125th Street n/a Wendy’s n/a A Wendy’s franchisee signed a lease for another restaurant, according to the New York Post. Jeff Schettino of Gis-combe Realty represented both landlord and tenant.

1290 Sixth Avenue 16,000 Kintetsu Interna-tional Express

Vornado Realty Trust

Kintetsu International Express, a Japanese travel agency, signed a 14-year deal. The asking rent was $57 a square foot, according to Crain’s. Paul Myers and Michael Movshovich of CB Richard Ellis represented Kintetsu. Building owner Vor-nado represented itself along with brokers from Cushman & Wakefield.



LEASE BEAT

MANHATTAN (continued)

44 West 18th Street 33,300 National Reprographics

Forty Four Eigh-teen Associates

National Reprographics renewed its lease. The asking rent was $30 per square foot, according to Crain’s. James Buslik and Alan Bonett of Adams & Co. represented both tenant and landlord Forty Four Eighteen Associates.

182 Duane Street 4,500 Lucca Antiques182 Stelen Realty Co

Los Angeles–based Lucca Antiques signed a five-year lease for 2,500 square feet on the ground floor and 2,000 square feet in the basement. The asking rent for the ground floor was around $77 a square foot, according to Crain’s. Robin Abrams and Joe Leinsdorf of the Lansco Corp. represented Lucca. Roxanne Betesh and Sarah Shannon of Sinvin Realty represented landlord 182 Stelen Realty Co.

601 Lexington Avenue 165,000 Citadel Investment Group

Boston Properties Citadel Investment Group expanded its lease from 90,000 square feet to 165,000, according to the New York Post. CB Richard Ellis’ John Nugent represented the tenant. Andrew Levin represented Boston Properties in-house, along with Jones Lang LaSalle’s Frank Doyle.

One Whitehall Street 42,000 Choice Logistics Rudin Family Choice Logistics expanded its lease by 7,000 square feet, extending its 35,000 existing square feet, according to the New York Post.

55 Broad Street 44,707RCN NY Communi-cations Rudin Family

RCN NY Communications extended its lease by 24,707 square feet for a total of 44,707 square feet, according to the New York Post.

55 Broad Street 24,707Align Communica-tions Rudin Family Align Communications signed a lease for 24,707 square feet, according to the New York Post.

118 Greenwich Avenue 1,800 Francois Latapie n/aFrancois Latapie signed an 1,800-square-foot lease, according to the New York Post. JDF Realty’s Leslie Siben brokered the transaction.


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Wolf Devours Ler-man’s Experience

Ilan Lerman, a Manhattan-based attorney known for his rep-resentation of myriad developers

and private-equity players during a 12-year legal career, has joined Wolf Haldenstein Adler Freeman & Herz as a partner in the law firm’s real estate practice.

Previously of counsel for the firm Paul, Hastings, Janofsky & Walker, where he had served since 1998, Mr. Lerman will now be tasked with representing many of the 122-year-old company’s most powerful real estate clients. In fact, the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law graduate has already provided legal repre-sentation for New York University in its purchase of the Forbes Build-ing on 60 Fifth Avenue in Manhat-tan.

“Lerman’s experience in trans-actional real estate work comple-ments our practice and will be a great resource for our real estate clients,” said Wolf Haldenstein partner Steven Sladkus in a pre-pared statement.

[email protected]

THE LOBBY


SUSA

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TAVA

; AN

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PASZ

TOR-

BEC

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The Waldorf Astoria, 301 Park Avenue, December 15

THIS WEEK’S PHOTOS

(l-r) Robert Tierney, Landmarks Preservation Commission chairman; Anthony Westreich, Monday Properties CEO and president; Manhattan Borough Presi-dent Scott Stringer; and City Councilman Daniel Garodnick.

The unveiling of the new lobby mural.

230 Park Avenue, January 11Monday Properties’ Unveiling of $1 M. Renovation and Mural

The University Club, 1 West 54th Street, January 12

The Young Men’s/Women’s Real Estate Association Monthly Luncheon

(seated, l-r) Glen J. Weiss, chairman of the YM/WREA; Harold Fetner, president and CEO of Durst Fetner Residential; Jody Durst, president of the Durst Organization; and Robin F. Fisher, vice chairman of the YM/WREA. Messrs. Fetner and Durst were guest speakers. (standing, l-r) Glenn Tolchin and Lind-say Ornstein, YM/WREA governors; Michael Rudder, treasurer; Brandl Frey, who heads the association’s membership; Alison Co!ey, governor; and David Berke, secretary.

the commercial observer | observer.com January 19, 2010 41the commercial observer | observer.com January 5, 2010


THIS WEEK’S PHOTOS

Panelists Norman Sturner of Murray Hill Properties; Mark Weiss of Newmark Knight Frank; Alan Victor of the Lansco Corporation; Brian Gell of CB Richard El-lis; and moderator Kenneth McCarthy of Cushman & Wakefield.

The Mendik Education Center, 570 Lexington Avenue, January 12REBNY’s ‘Deal-Making During the Downturn’ Seminar

CMBS CORNER

Source: TREPP LLC

Nigel Holmes


BY ROLAND LI

This week is divided between looking forward and backward, with the largest Upper Manhat-

tan sale of ’09 and fourth-quarter re-ports, alongside current humanitar-ian and local crises.

CB Richard Ellis (@cbrenyc) issues fourth-quarter reports.

CBRE Manhattan Market Re-search Media Breakfast: Manhattan o!ce market’s 2009 slide hits the brakes http://bit.ly/7W7PHq

7:38 AM Jan 13th from Tweet-Deck

RT @cbrecorp CBRE EA: US o!ce, industrial & retail vac rates continue to rise, but pace slows; multi-family unchanged http://bit.ly/5rCE1X

7:22 AM Jan 13th from Tweet-Deck

Cushman & Wakefield (@CushWakeNYC) is generous

with the re-tweets.

RT @CarylComm: Reading big-news: CUSHMAN & WAKEFIELD INKS 32,000-SQUARE-FOOT HEAD-QUARTERS RENEWAL http://bit.ly/8bHOZQ

9:31 AM Jan 14th from web

RT @CrainsNewYork: Manhattan leasing activity dropped 15% in 2009 http://bit.ly/4ZcMKC


Triennale Design Museum to open first U.S. location at 40 West 53rd St - http://tinyurl.com/yebukga


Massey Knakal (@masseyknakal)’s biggest sale: $26.9 million in cash.

MK Closes Largest Upper Man-hattan Sale of 2009 http://bit.ly/7OSnIO


Why to buy investment proper-ties in Queens: http://bit.ly/8GPaLP


Check out Robert Knakal’s latest StreetWise post:10 Things to Watch in 2010 (Part 3) http://bit.ly/6wUeDt


RT @greenpearlnyc: NYC Real Estate Execs to Speak at Distressed Real Estate Summit, Feb 4, includ-ing: Lenobel, Chandan, Knakal http://bi ...


MK Sells Six Brooklyn Buildings in December with an aggregate val-ue of over $6.5 million. http://bit.ly/5C108d


Eastern Consolidated (@East-ernconsol) brings the listings.

Cobble Hill mixed-use residen-tial opportunity at 495 Henry Street for sale, with price break, http://bit.

ly/5UUjIw2:11 PM Jan 14th from web

133-135 Greenwich Street, prime Downtown location, +/-150,000 buildable sf & plans for 33-story luxury tower, for sale, http://bit.ly/8hTy5a

2:08 PM Jan 14th from web

Prime New York Downtown +/-5,125 sf vacant development site for sale at 115-117 Nassau Street, http://bit.ly/5bOpMN

12:59 PM Jan 13th from web

CPEX Real Estate (@CPEXRe-alEstate) joins the relief e"orts.

Text “HAITI” to 90999 to donate $10 to Red Cross relief e"orts in #haiti

8:30 AM Jan 15th from CoTweet

New Listing: 314-318 49th St in Brooklyn. 4,600 sf development site in Sunset Park. Asking $975k. http://bit.ly/8TytGU


Event: Timothy D. King will be a panelist at the @BROOKLYN_EDC Supermarket Attraction Seminar 1/14/2010. http://bit.ly/5EDncW


REBNY (@rebny) takes on the M.T.A. and President Obama.

At the ABNY breakfast this morn-ing, MTA CEO Jay Walder promised to fix ine!ciencies & bring better service to NYC; REBNY hopes he delivers.

6:05 AM Jan 16th from HootSuite

Mayor Bloomberg is right: Obama bank tax will hurt NYC: http://ow.ly/WTqU

12:05 PM Jan 15th from Hoot-Suite

Mass transit is NYC lifeline- MTA faces $400M deficit in 2010.

9:56 AM Jan 15th from HootSuite

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TUESDAY, JANUARY 19

So, the first fairly obvious problem with holding a business-card-ex-change party at a barbecue joint is, well, just really fairly obvious. But once you get past the challenges of handling barbecue sauce and small pieces of cardboard simultaneously, the Evantz Saint-Gerard & Dean Graber–sponsored Nassau-area net-working event promises to be a fun or an odd way for real estate brokers, developers, builders and attorneys to break bread together. Just keep it clean, guys. … Kenneth Springer first made his name as a fraud inspec-tor for the Federal Bureau of In-vestigation. Now the president and founder of his own investigative firm, Mr. Springer is taking his show on the road in the post-Mado! era, and the National Realty Club is hosting the sleuth for a speaking engagement that’s expected to touch on the sordid side of the private-equity and capital markets. Should be spooky.

[Nassau Business Card Exchange, the Spare Rib, 600 West Old Country Road, Hicksville, Long Island, 6 p.m., email [email protected] for more info; National Realty Club “Due Dili-gence in the Post-Mado! Era” sem-inar, the Friars Club, 57 East 55th Street, noon, www.nationalrealty-club.com]

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 20

When, in 1975, the New York State Su-preme Court struck down Grand Cen-tral’s landmark status, the Municipal Art Society and Jacqueline Kenne-dy Onassis went into action, spark-ing a campaign that would eventually save the vaunted terminal from be-coming an o"ce tower for Penn Cen-tral Railroad. So it’s no surprise that each Wednesday, the talented MAS guides return to the scene of near disaster for an informative walking tour of the terminal’s magnificent Beaux-Arts interiors. … Have burning questions about Stuy Town? Starrett City? Or, more pressingly, do you ever wonder how the media decides what to cover and how when it comes to big-time real estate? You do? Wow, we’re flattered! N.Y.U.’s Schack In-stitute of Real Estate is hosting a

breakfast roundtable moderated by The New York Times’ Charles Bagli, badass dean of the economic develop-ment beat (and a New York Observer alumn), with panelists Tom Topou-sis of the New York Post, Amanda Fung of Crain’s and our very own El-iot Brown.

[Municipal Art Society Grand Cen-tral Terminal walking tour, meet at the information booth, main con-course, Grand Central Terminal, 12:30 p.m., www.mas.org; “Fair Deals? Fair Coverage? Reporter Roundtable on Two Big Deals from ‘the Boom’” breakfast roundtable, N.Y.U. Washington Square Campus, 8 a.m., R.S.V.P. at www.scps.nyu.edu/schackpressevent]

THURSDAY, JANUARY 21

Perhaps the biggest real estate event of the year, the Real Estate Board of New York will host its 114th An-nual Banquet, with major awards ex-pected to go to Sandy Lindenbaum, Robert Knakal, David Greenbaum, Todd Korren, Ralph DiRuggiero and Frederick Peters. The event, which is a full 32 years older than the Academy Awards, is sure to cap-ture the buzz this month. … But as star-studded as the REBNY ceremo-ny threatens to be, don’t count out the 2010 Annual State of the Insur-ance Industry seminar, which prom-ises to be even more scandalous than last year’s event. Michael De Chiara of Zetlin & De Chiara and Rosemary Scanlon of N.Y.U.’s Shack Institute of Real Estate will lead a panel of ex-perts in a not-to-be-missed insur-ance extravaganza. … Now that even your mom is tweeting, it’s no surprise that the architects of the world want to do it, too. To that end, the Ameri-can Institute of Architects is host-ing “Why Blog, Text and Tweet: Tips and Tricks” and, well, you may as well learn sooner rather than later, right? Right. … The Metropolitan New York Chapter of the Apprais-al Institute is holding its two-day “Appraisers Course” on Thursday, Jan. 21, and Friday, Jan. 22. The rest is self-explanatory. … Putting mar-ket volatility and risk in perspective is never easy to do, but Association of Real Estate Women members Sheila Soufian and colleague Robert Stansbury intend to help put attend-

ees of this AREW seminar at ease.[The Real Estate Board of New

York Annual Banquet, New York Hilton Hotel, 1335 Avenue of the Americas, 5:30 p.m. cocktails, 7 p.m. dinner, call Thomas Gri"n at 212-532-3100 for more info; 2010 State of the Insurance Industry seminar, the McGraw-Hill Auditorium, 1221 Avenue of the Americas, 8 a.m., call Whitney Murray at 212-682-6800 or email her at [email protected] for more info; American Insti-tute of Architects-NY “Blog, Text and Tweet” seminar, the Center for Architecture, 536 LaGuardia Place, 6 p.m., www.aiany.org; Appraisal In-stitute “Appraisers Course,” the Real Estate Board of New York’s Mendik Education Center, 570 Lexington Av-enue, 9 a.m., call 866-966-3710 for more info; Association of Real Es-tate Women Finances workshop and seminar, 1290 Avenue of the Ameri-cas, Duplex Room, 15th floor, 8 a.m., www.arew.org]

SATURDAY, JANUARY 23

For those poor souls for whom saggy jeans kept them far removed from the Manhattan club scene, or those sad, sad state-school graduates who were snubbed by the Harvard Club, the talented tour guides at the Mu-nicipal Art Society are o!ering an all-access pass inside Manhattan’s most privileged social clubs. Indeed, the “Midtown=Clubland!” tour will hit midtown landmarks like the Union League and the Century Associa-tion, allowing rare glimpses into a world where men still wear top hats and everybody eats heaping serv-ings of bald eagle for breakfast. And for wayward sailing enthusiasts, the tour, which includes a stop at the New York Yacht Club, could provide a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to rub shoulders with current and for-mer commodores of the Gipsy Moth IV, to name but one example of the kind of mind-blowingly famous peo-ple still cavorting at such fancy-pants social clubs.

[Municipal Art Society “Midtown= Clubland” walking tour, meet at the northeast corner of Park Avenue and 37th Street, 2 p.m., www.mas.org]

SUNDAY, JANUARY 24

At the turn of the century, city planners envisioned a subway system worthy of attractive design and great beauty. More than a century later, the city’s hundreds of rails and trains have, in-deed, been transformed into public works of art. Consider gra"ti—most notably by the artist/gang Dominican’s Don’t Play—but also the performance artists regu-larly found sleeping on

trains and selling M&M’s. Seeking to learn more about the system’s art and architecture, the Municipal Art Society will lead a tour from the Bat-tery to midtown, inspecting the origi-nal 1904 IRT designs as well as the In-dependent Line that opened in 1932 and a 1970s-era redesign.

[Municipal Art Society “Subway Art and Architecture, Historically Speaking” walking tour, meet on the steps of the former U.S. Custom House at Bowling Green, at the foot of Broadway, 2 p.m., www.mas.org]

MONDAY, JANUARY 25

The Industrial and O!ce Real Es-tate Brokers Association is hosting its second annual “Urban Develop-er’s Night” at the Robert Treat Hotel. The Newark area gala will showcase a collection of current and new-ly renovated commercial projects and feature words of wisdom from Marc Berson of the Fidelco Real-ty Group and Gus Milano of Hartz Mountain Industries. “Urban De-veloper’s Night,” meanwhile, will be

followed by the Sixth Annual Urban Music Awards, which will feature the dope rhymes of Fabolous, 2L8 and Young Money. … Speaking of Young Money, the Young Mortgage Bankers Association is hosting a seminar called “Beyond the Banter: What’s Really Happening with Note Sales?” Need we say more? Doubt it. … As Kermit the Frog once said, “It

ain’t easy being green.” Doug-las Durst (pictured) and a few other environmen-

tally friendly develop-ers might disagree, but for the most part, it’s generally agreed that building green is no walk in the

park. That’s why the nonprofit Solar One is

hosting a free workshop aimed at showing prop-

erty owners, share-holders and manag-

ers how to make their buildings good and green.

[Industrial and O"ce Real Estate Brokers Association second annual “Ur-

ban Developer’s Night,” Robert Treat Hotel, 50 Park Place, Newark, N.J., 5 p.m. cocktails, 6:30 dinner, www.iore-ba.com; Young Mortgage Bankers As-sociation “Beyond the Banter: What’s Really Happening with Note Sales” seminar, the Union League Club, 38 East 37th Street, noon, call Sonia Ol-iveira at 201-440-8144 or send an email to [email protected] for more info; “Green from the Inside Out” work-shop, the 14th Street Y, 344 East 14th Street, 6:30 p.m., call Celia Salgado at 212-505-6050 or email her at [email protected] for more info]

TUESDAY, JANUARY 26

If you were a professional in the real estate biz, you could meet some like-minded friends at the local watering hole, get drunk and chat about prop-erty. But the Association of Real Es-tate Women has taken that idea and elevated it a notch or two: Instead of meeting at just any old bar, they’re holding their soiree at the 21 Club. So expect some class at this fiesta, ladies. … The New York Commercial Real Estate Women will kick o! 2010 with its Industry Spotlight Series, which this week turns its gaze to “Global Trends in the Capital Markets.” Al-ixPartners managing director Den-nis Yeskey will weigh in on the global trends to look out for in the Teens. … Getting an ad message across to a po-tential mark can be di"cult. For one, you need a good gimmick—some-thing that’ll get ’em buzzing and, in turn, spending their dough. For this, the nationally renowned entertainer Lady Gaga will be a featured speaker when the Real Estate Board of New York hosts its seminar “Write for Success: Getting Your Ad Message Across” at the group’s weekly break-fast club series. (Note: Lady Gaga, in fact, will not be speaking at the event. Instead, Teri Pomerantz of Corpo-rate Communication Services will do her best to be informative on the topic.) … To truly understand New York City, one might reason, you need to start with Lower Manhattan. With that idea in mind, the guides of the Municipal Art Society are continu-ing the nonprofit’s weekly downtown walking tour, which will include visits to Wall Street and at least a few really old churches.

[Association of Real Estate Wom-en networking soiree, the 21 Club, 21 West 52nd Street, 6 p.m., www.arew.org; New York Commercial Real Es-tate Women 2010 Capital Markets seminar, UBS Building, 1285 Avenue of the Americas, 6 p.m., www.nycrew.org; Real Estate Board of New York Residential Breakfast Club, REB-NY Mendik Education Center, 570 Lexington Avenue, 9:30 a.m., email [email protected] for more info; Municipal Art Society “Downtown, Where New York Began” walking tour, meet at the Downtown Informa-tion Center, 55 Exchange Place, Suite 401, 12:30 p.m., www.mas.org]

Calendar items can be sent to Jotham Sederstrom at [email protected].

CALENDAR


Douglas Durst Jonathan Durst

Member®

R E A L E S T A T E B O A R D O F N E W Y O R K


TRI-1599 TrinityThankU-OBSVR.indd 1 1/18/10 6:36:39 PM

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