“The New Rochelle area has a very limited range of select-service,
full service or extended-stay hotels and this property has enjoyed
substantial market share premiums since it opened,” said Jeffrey
Fisher, chief executive of Chatham Lodging. [more]

From the August issue: While the residential market might be improving for brokers, construction firms are still severely suffering, and the immediate outlook for improvement appears bleak.

Indeed, construction firms in the city are competing for every scrap of work they can find. And large firms that a few years ago would never have considered jobs under $10 million are going head-to-head with smaller companies for jobs as small as $1 million to $2 million.

In this month’s Q & A, The Real Deal talked to construction firm executives and to experts who either work in or follow the industry in New York City. While most said that activity for interior office renovations is up, they don’t expect much business from new residential or commercial development in the next year or two. [more]

2. Borough President Scott Stringer addresses opponents of NYU expansion [DNAinfo] 

3. Community council wants Brooklyn Bridge Park’s tobacco warehouse to remain a public, multi-use facility [Brooklyn Heights Blog] 

4. Historic preservation tax credit program gets cut from state budget [ArchPaper] 

5. New residential and commercial developments transform Long Island City [WSJ] 

6. Three more floors to be built at 300 Broome Street on Lower East Side [Bowery Boogie] 

7. West Park Presbyterian Church on Upper West Side holds bake sale to raise $11 million for renovations [DNAinfo]
8. Antiques Garage signs new lease to remain in Chelsea location on 25th Street [NYT] 

9. 23-acre estate on market for $11.24 million in East Marion in Suffolk County [Newsday] 

10. “Devil Wears Prada” author Lauren Weisberger buys Chelsea condo for $2.6 million [NYT] 

11. Glenn Close sells corner apartment at the Beresford for $10.2 million [NYO] 

12. Artist Setsuo Ito to auction $11 million Water Mill estate in the Hamptons [Curbed, 1st item]

Chetrit, the cousin of real estate developer Joseph Chetrit, had been
in talks with Chicago-based Wrightwood Capital, after the lender filed
to foreclose on the building’s $13.5 million debt in April.

After buying the loan from Wrightwood, Chetrit reached a new loan
assignment agreement with Signature Bank, and he is expected to
foreclose on the note, according to loan documents filed with the
department. The 14-story office building had been marketed for
residential conversion by Eastern Consolidated, but Chetrit declined
comment on what he plans to do with the building in the near term. [more]

Joanna Simon, a vice president at Fox Residential Group, won’t have any trouble talking up her latest exclusive at 870 United Nations Plaza: it’s her 10th listing in the building, where she herself lives. The two-bedroom co-op, unit 21B, was the home of tennis star Hamilton “Ham” Richardson and his wife, Midge, a past editor of Seventeen Magazine, and later, had one frequent visitor: Walter Cronkite, with whom Simon was romantically linked. It is on the market for $1.55 million, Simon told The Real Deal.
[more]

The vacancy rate for Downtown surpassed the vacancy rate for Midtown
for the first time in nearly two years as several large blocks of
space were returned to the market in Lower Manhattan, data from
commercial services firm Cassidy Turley showed.

The vacancy rate for Downtown was 13.5 percent in July, compared to a
rate of 12.8 percent for Midtown. The month earlier Midtown had a
higher rate.

The last time the Downtown rate was higher was in November 2008, when
it had a vacancy rate of 10.1 percent while Midtown had a rate of 9.7
percent, figures from Cassidy Turley showed.

Robert Sammons, director of research for Cassidy Turley, said it was
the historical norm for Downtown to have a higher vacancy rate. [more]

The tally of distressed properties in New York City grew last month along with the delinquency rate, according to data from analytics firm Trepp compiled for The Real Deal. Just under $4 billion worth of delinquent loans on 49 city properties (click here for the full list) made for a 5.8 percent delinquency rate in July, up from 5.6 percent, or $3.8 billion in delinquent loans citywide, the month before, Trepp data shows. Largely due to the massive, $3 billion loan balance on the foreclosed Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village on the East Side of Manhattan, New York State ranked second in the U.S. — behind California and ahead of Florida — for delinquent loan volume, with $6.1 billion of the country’s $47.6 billion. New York City alone has a higher loan balance than 47 of the 50 states, including Texas, Nevada, and Arizona. [more]

Real estate taxes have been reduced 17 percent on the Cammeyer, a pre-war loft conversion at 650 Sixth Avenue and the corner of 20th Street in the Flatiron district. Core’s Fredrik Eklund, who is handling sales, said that the reduction in real estate taxes could make the building more attractive to potential buyers. The 67-unit building is being developed by the Kumkang Housing Corporation. Residences include studios, one- and two-bedroom units, as well as three-bedroom penthouses, ranging in size from 700 square feet up to 2,035 square feet, with prices starting at $895,000. [more]

The copy and printing retailer is leaving another Durst building next door at 205 East 42nd Street, where drugmaker Pfizer in May put 366,000 square feet of office space on the market.

The new lease is for a smaller ground floor presence but a larger lease overall. At 205 East 42nd Street, Staples occupied 6,950 square feet on the ground floor and about 1,800 square feet in the basement. At the new location on Third Avenue, set to open in the fall, the retailer will have 5,270 square feet on the ground floor and 6,479 square feet on the second floor. [more]

On Tuesday there was high drama over at the Landmarks Preservation Commission. This group, which is used to basking in the near-total indifference of the citizenry, must have been surprised and delighted to find their obscure mumblings broadcast live on NY1 News, as though this were a presidential impeachment or a health-care vote on the floor of the U.S. Senate. When it was all over, they had voted unanimously not to grant landmark status to an ugly old building at 45-47 Park Place, which was in effect a vote in favor of the proposed Islamic Center. In truth, Landmarks was presented with a thankless task: they would be damned either way. [more]

2. Premiums for FHA-guaranteed loans may face restructuring [Inman] 

3. Assemblyman Vito Lopez got campaign cash from winning Greenpoint Hospital bidder [Brooklyn Paper] 

4. Survey says most Manhattan residents now oppose Ground Zero mosque [DNAinfo] 

5. AIG Chairman Stewart Greenfield closes on $4.2 million apartment at 1016 Fifth Avenue [NYO, 2nd item] 

6. Subway restaurant opens on Avenue U in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn [Sheepshead Bites] 

7. 15 out of 19 stories built at Thomas O’Hara-designed V3 hotel in Downtown Brooklyn [Brownstoner] 

8. 25-year-old writer willing to pay $1,400 a month for room in Manhattan apartment, provided that roommate isn’t Apple user [NYO]
9. Gansevoort Park Hotel delays opening to Aug.16 but hopes to entice guests with Porsche rides [Hotel Chatter]

From the August issue: Interviewing celebrity real estate broker Adam Modlin is a bit like a Cold War-era rendezvous with a double agent. You pick a day and time, and move your assets — reporter and photographer — into the general area. Then you wait for a phone call to reveal the exact coordinates of your meeting. After several last-minute delays, an e-mail directs you to a dark hotel bar, and you find Modlin in a corner booth, sipping a designer sparkling water. “Sit down,” says Modlin, whose stylish threads would suit Daniel Craig’s 007 — matching gray vest, pants, and tie from the new Tom Ford collection, black loafers with a gold bit, Rolex watch, Chrome Hearts glasses. [more]

The decision means that thousands of current and former Stuyvesant Town/Peter Cooper Village tenants will be able to pursue MetLife for retroactive rent that was charged prior to the $5.4 billion sale of the complex.

“We are studying the opinion in order to determine our next steps,” said Met Life spokesman John Calagna.

“The court in a very strong decision concluded that the case would apply retroactively,” said City Council member Dan Garodnick, a resident of Stuyvesant Town, and long-time tenant advocate. “That is a significant development for tenants.” [more]

While investing in a fixer-upper home can seem like a golden opportunity, Barbara Corcoran, founder of the Corcoran Group, said that the wrong pick can be fraught with pitfalls. To avoid “money pits” and find a true diamond in the rough, Corcoran says in this Today show video that you should be wary of water damage, termites and other home fixes that require extensive repair. Meanwhile, cosmetic changes, like remodeling parts of the home, can be an inexpensive project. “Kitchen is the easiest fix in the house,” Corcoran said, adding that outdoor landscaping is a fast fix, as well. “It’s really a hidden gem.. you put in a little bit of money on landscaping, you get it back in spades.”

Eighty percent of the 66 apartments are now leased at the Zazza Williamsburg project at 424 Bedford Avenue in South Williamsburg, according to developer Michael Zazza, principal of the Zazza Group, the Daily Eagle reported. Marketing began in February for the 20-story building, which was first conceived as a condo, but eventually “had to go rental because of the economy,” Zazza said at Brooklyn Real Estate Roundtable’s quarterly luncheon yesterday. “We were lucky to get a bank behind us.” [more]