Harry Macklowe

In 2007, after selling the Financial Times Building on Sixth Avenue to Harry Macklowe for a sizable $498 million, DekaBank receded from the New York real estate scene. Now the German bank is coming back, and not just to New York. The bank is actually reclaiming some of 1330 Avenue of the Americas—this time as tenants, not landlords.

DekaBank has signed a seven-year, 3,760-square-foot lease on the 23rd floor of the 40-story tower at an undisclosed rent. Given the tower’s primo Plaza district location at 54th Street and its recent $30 million renovation, rent is likely to be well over $100 a square foot annually.  read more »

Finally, the dithering has stopped! New York City’s real estate deciders are at last grappling with the monumental decision at hand come November: Do we want an Illinoisan or an Arizonan in the White House?

It’s taken them a while. Last we checked, in mid-July, campaign finance records showed few developers and landlords had contributed to either McCain or Obama (though plenty had donated to the coffers of hometown favorites Hillary and Rudy). But by late July, it seems they’d finally come to terms with the sorry fact that, barring a Giuliani-led military coup, there will not be a New Yorker in the White House.  read more »

Pretty gosh darned rich, according to Forbes magazine.

Twelve of New York’s celebrated real estate titans bought, sold and leveraged their way onto or up Forbes' 2008 list of the 400 wealthiest Americans. While the vast sums of wealth are truly staggering, New York’s wealthy real estate developers still lag far behind the big players on Wall Street; in fact, no real estate developer was rich enough to crack America’s top 50–-Paul Milstein and family were closest at No. 68.

The list: wealth (in billions) and ranking

• Paul Milstein and family: $5 (68)
• Richard LeFrak and family: $4.5 (78)
• Stephen Ross: $4.5 (78)
• Leonard Stern: $3.7 (97)
• Donald Trump: $3 (134)
• Mort Zuckerman: $2.8 (147)
• John Catsimatidis: $2.1 (215)
• Sheldon Solow: $2 (227)
• Jerry Speyer: $2 (227)
• Tamir Sapir: $1.9 (246)
• Leon Charney: $1.5 (321)
• Steve Roth: $1.3 (377)

The Forbes 400 capped a rather unpleasant year for Harry Macklowe. Last year, Mr. Macklowe was the 239th wealthiest American, with an estimated fortune of $2 billion and an impressive portfolio of some of New York's finest real estate (the GM Building!). This year: unranked.

"Serves them right for tearing down such a wonderful hotel to build another ugly residential property." ["Deutsche Sues to Foreclose on Macklowe's Drake Hotel Site"]

Billy Macklowe may have deposed his father, Harry, and their overleveraged troubles may have become yet another chapter in the New York City’s rich history of fortunes won, fortunes lost and fortunes just barely rescued, but the detritus of the Macklowe midtown empire lives on in a state of purgatory.

Nary a peep has been heard in recent months about the four remaining towers that Deutsche Bank put on the block earlier this year. Deutsche reclaimed the $7 billion, seven-tower portfolio after Macklowe Properties defaulted on the $5.8 billion worth of loans from the bank that were required to buy the buildings in 2007.  read more »

Under the new leadership of the dashing Billy Macklowe, Macklowe Properties appears to be lumbering ahead with its complicated and complication-ridden Drake Hotel development.

Either that, or Macklowe Properties is busy assembling a more lucrative parcel in the East 50s around Park Avenue to put on the market—Macklowe was reportedly considering selling the mega-site in May, before successfully selling the GM Building to Mort Zuckerman’s Boston Properties for a record-breaking $2.8 billion.

Either way, Audemars Piguet, the sole tenant in 40 East 57th Street, is out. Capping 14 months of negotiations, Macklowe has bought out the remaining 10 years on the Swiss watchmaker’s lease.  read more »

In the wake of his father Harry's near disastrous over-leveraging of the family business, Billy Macklowe has officially been named Macklowe Properties' new chairman and CEO. He has been working with his father since 1992, after a stint as a real estate finance analyst for Manufactures Hanover.

His father Harry has been named Chairman Emeritus of the firm.

The father and son were said to have a fractious relationship, which, according to a recent Wall Street Journal article, was made worse by Macklowe Properties' credit crisis woes. The tension between the two is said to have helped precipitate this change in the ranks.  read more »

Domestic players have bought three huge midtown towers once belonging to the beleaguered Macklowe Properties.

Shorenstein Properties has bought Park Avenue Tower and 850 Third Avenue for just shy of $1 billion.  read more »

The GM Building sale is "closing as we speak." That's according to Mort Zuckerman, who is addressing a Real Estate Board of New York luncheon this afternoon.

Mr. Zuckerman's Boston Properties, along with partners including Goldman Sachs, negotiated the purchase of the Macklowe Properties building late last month in a deal that valued it at around $2.8 billion. It's the most expensive building sale ever.

Albert Behler’s Paramount Group is one of the last behemoths standing in the competition to pay $1.5 billion for 1301 Avenue of the Americas, the Credit Lyonnais building that Harry Macklowe surrendered to Deutsche Bank earlier this year.  read more »

Mark Lanier, the 47-year-old attorney who litigated his way to CNBC fame by taking on Merck’s dreaded Vioxx, and who’s now representing sugar-cane farmers in their suit against Splenda, is doubling the size of his footprint in Harry Macklowe’s Tower 56.

Mr.  read more »

The first few days after the biggest U.S. building sale ever was inked, things at the GM Building were “pretty much routine” in the words of one doorman, save for the presence of a few unofficial, four-legged tenants seen scampering among the stuffed animals at FAO Schwartz.

Not many people who work at the GM Building appeared to notice that Harry Macklowe had hammered out a deal with Mort Zuckerman and partners on Saturday to sell the jewel in his real estate crown for about $2.8 billion. By now, longtime GM tenants have surely grown accustomed to a changing of the guard every so often. Manhattan's most expensive office tower has had four different owners since 1991—five if you count Sheldon Solow—some of whom have shaken things up, and others less so.  read more »

Harry Macklowe’s early morning Saturday sale of the GM Building and three other midtown towers to a group led by Mort Zuckerman’s Boston Properties did more than just yank New York’s most virile phallus from the market. The GM Building deal slaughtered what had become a favorite scapegoat among brokers for the dip in Manhattan building sales: that investors, bewildered by the credit crisis and unsure how to price their buildings, were waiting for Mr. Macklowe to trade and show them the way.  read more »

Billy Macklowe, president of Macklowe Properties since 2002, is expected in the next few weeks to succeed his father as chairman of the firm, according to the Wall Street Journal this morning.

The succession, not entirely voluntary on Harry's part, is fallout from the nearly $4 billion deal cut over the weekend that cost the Macklowes ownership of their jewel, the GM Building at 767 Fifth Avenue, as well as three other Midtown towers.  read more »

Here's a clip from January of Mort Zuckerman, a regular on The McGlaughlin Group (we're surprised, too).

Mr. Zuckerman's comments on the credit crisis and how that helped tank the economy seems today especially relevant and perhaps a bit ironic, given how all that played into his acquisition over the weekend of Harry Macklowe's GM Building and three other Midtown towers.  read more »

A group led by Boston Properties chairman and Daily News publisher Mort Zuckerman is set to buy the GM Building from the embattled Harry Macklowe for about $2.9 billion, according to a Saturday morning announcement from Mr. Zuckerman's firm. (The announcement can be read here.) It is the biggest building sale in U.S. history, trumping the $1.8 billion deal for 666 Fifth Avenue, which closed in early 2007.

Mr. Zuckerman's group, which includes Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley as investors and advisers, also is set to buy three other midtown towers belonging to Mr. Macklowe: 540 Madison Avenue, a 39-story building at 55th Street; 125 West 55th Street, a 23-story building between Sixth and Seventh avenues; and the 44-story Two Grand Central Tower between Lexington and Third avenues.

The four-tower deal, according to Boston Properties, totals approximately $3.949 billion, including $1.4655 billion in cash and the assumption of $2.4735 billion in fixed-rate debt. The sale of the GM Building is expected to close in June and the others shortly after.  read more »

Still waiting...

Two days after the New York Post declared an announcement was imminent about Mort Zuckerman's effort to buy Harry Macklowe's GM Building (and assorted other towers), we're still waiting.

"[W]e should learn all of the details today, when the pact is due to be announced," the Post reported on Wednesday.

Sorry to sound so impatient, but what a tease!

We'll touch base later.

"[W]e should learn all of the details today, when the pact is due to be announced," the New York Post declared on Wednesday, referring to the ongoing negotiations between Mort Zuckerman's Boston Properties and Harry Macklowe over the fate of his beloved GM Building and four other Manhattan towers.

But, like with much of the Macklowe saga, now in its fourth month, fresh news remained scarce. Yesterday passed with nary a peep from Mr. Macklowe or Mr. Zuckerman.  read more »

Harry Macklowe, the troubled real estate mogul desperately trying to extricate himself from a morass of debt obligations by selling off stakes in his GM Building, the Equity Office portfolio he bought from Blackstone last year, and other Manhattan properties, is back in the news.

The New York Post ran big today with the headline, “Macklowe finds a way out,” with the Wall Street Journal running a very similar story, “Goldman, Boston Properties, Others in Talks to Buy Macklowe’s GM Building.”

It was the first spot of new news on Macklowe in months, or so it seemed. But how has it changed what we know, and what we don’t know, about the elusive Mr. Macklowe?

Here’s a breakdown of what we've known for a while. After that, we give you a run-down of the "news" in the Post and Wall Street Journal's coverage.  read more »

From the Post today:

A partnership of Kirk Kerkorian's MGM Mirage and investment company Dubai World has held discussions about buying the Drake Hotel site from developer Harry Macklowe...

 read more »

Where’s Harry Macklowe?

Has the once mighty real estate titan taken a wind-powered voyage on his sailboat, Unfurled, to some mysterious locale still untouched by rumors of his catastrophic fall from the acme of Manhattan real estate?  read more »

Fifteen minutes ago was the deadline for developers to bid on one of Manhattan's prime trophy properties -- 1301 Avenue of the Americas, also known as the Credit Lyonnais Building, at the corner of 52nd Street.

The cloud-buster is one of the seven so-called "Equity Portfolio" properties that beleaguered mogul Harry Macklowe bought last year for $7 billion (in those bubbly days, he only had to put down $50 million of his own money).  read more »

If you needed any reminder that the fog of litigation clouding the allegedly “fraudulent” sale of the GM Building to Harry Macklowe in 2003 involves actual people, rife with human intrigue, here’s a reminder from an affidavit signed by real estate developer and investor Leslie Dick.

We know it's confusing; but first, some background: Mr. Dick alleges that celebrity financier George Soros rigged bidding so that the trophy building would end up in Mr. Macklowe's hands. We'll get into the nitty gritty of that some other time. The real point of this post is to share the following juicy tidbit from the affidavit: Mr. Dick claims that, after he wrote Mr. Soros in November 2003 expressing his concern about the sale, Mr. Soros spied on him.  read more »

Eastdil Secured has been hired to market Harry Macklowe's 1.765 million-square-foot office tower at 1301 Avenue of the Americas, according to the Post. The tower could set a single-building sales record, even in this cooling investment sales climate.

If it gets anywhere over $1,000 a square foot--eminently possible for a top-shelf Midtown building--1301 Avenue of the Americas could sell for at least $1.765 billion, which would put it just a shade below the all-time building record of $1.8 billion, which belongs to 666 Fifth Avenue and its owner, Kushner Companies.  read more »

For many Turtle Bay residents, the fatal crane collapse at 303 East 51st Street on March 15 was more than just an accident that should have been prevented: It was three years of frenzied residential development come home to roost.

A New York Post column published the morning after began, “Katherine Hepburn must be turning in her grave,” in reference to the late actress and one of the more famous Turtle Bay locals. “Shoddy construction by greedy moneymen is destroying the whole Turtle Bay area around Second Avenue, filling the neighborhood she loved with countless world-class ugly buildings,” Linda Stasi wrote. “What they’ve done to Second Avenue in the last few years is criminal. Yesterday it turned deadly.”

Like most neighborhoods in Manhattan, many new condos have gone up recently in Turtle Bay—the area roughly between 42nd and 53rd streets east of Lexington Avenue—and more projects are in the pipeline. But aside from the recently arrested buildings inspector, no criminal activity has been linked to the other developments. Bruce Silberblatt, vice president of the neighborhood residents’ group the Turtle Bay Association, rattled off at least 11 residential projects that are in various stages of development or have recently come on-line.  read more »

Real estate investor--and Sears Tower co-owner--Joseph Cayre has dropped out of the bidding for Harry Macklowe's General Motors Building at 767 Fifth Avenue, according to Crain's, which cites a source with knowledge of the deal.

The second round of bids were due today. With Mr. Cayre out, there may be only two bidders left, including Larry Silverstein. The GM Building would likely fetch over $3 billion if sold in full--apparently a price tag too steep for Mr. Cayre.  read more »

My, Sheldon Solow is busy these days.

It’s now the 11th hour for his $4 billion East River development, which faces an up or down vote before the City Council tomorrow; and best and final bids are due tomorrow for one of the country’s most watched skyscrapers, the GM Building, a tower Mr. Solow claims he rightfully owns.  read more »

For the first two months of 2008, the Manhattan landscape for big-building sales has been an arid one, as rattled lenders and wary sellers sit tight amid the credit drought.

Manhattan has seen only one sale over $400 million since the end of 2007, a year when such sales poured forth on a monthly, if not weekly, basis.  read more »

Embattled landlord Harry Macklowe has closed in on an extension to repay billions in loans he took last February to buy seven Manhattan office buildings. Jennifer S. Forsyth reports in the Wall Street Journal this morning that Mr. Macklowe has neared an agreement with lender Deutsche Bank to turn over control of the buildings in exchange for a six- to 12-month extension.

Deutsche had sold some of the debt to smaller lenders, including Vornado Realty Trust, which had refused to go along with the extension plan. Apparently, Steve Roth's Vornado has come onboard and the plan is moving forward.

Mr. Macklowe also took a personally guaranteed loan of $1.2 billion from Fortress Investment Group for last February's deal. That loan has grown to $1.4 billion with interest, but Mr. Macklowe reached an extension with Fortress, too.  read more »

A reported bidder for the GM Building, Joseph Cayre, is not usually mentioned in the same breath as the usual real estate bigwigs (Jerry Speyer, Steven Roth, etc.), but the investor is hardly a small player. The Wall Street Journal’s Jennifer Forsyth brings us the news today that Mr. Cayre was one of at least three bidders offering more than $3 billion for Harry Macklowe’s GM Building at 767 Fifth Avenue; Larry Silverstein was another.  read more »

Harry Macklowe, struggling with $7 billion of debt come due, has reached an extension agreement with his lenders, according to a statement put out by his spokesman, Howard Rubenstein.

Mr. Macklowe, who is taking bids today for his prized GM Building, was granted extensions of unspecified terms by both Deutsche Bank and Fortress Investment Group, his principal lenders, according to Mr. Rubenstein. Repayments on much of Mr. Macklowe’s debt were due a week ago.  read more »

We're still trying to find out who has bid initially for Harry Macklowe's GM Building. The first round of bids was due today. Mr. Macklowe needs the money from the sale of arguably the world's most valuable office tower to pay off $7 billion in debt from a purchase of seven Manhattan office buildings last February...

Which brings us to this: The last media story mentioned and linked to from the Macklowe Properties' Web site (under the "Macklowe News" tab) is one by The New York Times from Feb. 21, 2007, trumpeting the triumph that was that building-portfolio buy.  read more »

The first round of bids are due today for Harry Macklowe's GM Building at 767 Fifth Avenue. Who will bid?

Just to bring you up to speed: Mr. Macklowe, one of the most well-known developers and landlords (and one of the most controversial) in New York since the 1980's bought seven Manhattan office buildings last winter for nearly $7 billion. He put up a very small amount of that money himself and borrowed the rest, including $1.2 billion, which he personally guaranteed and which happens to be about half the current market value of the GM Building. So... here we are.  read more »

Many expect the GM Building to sell for at least $3 billion (The Times referenced $3.5 billion this morning). If it does go for $3.5 billion, that will mean it will have sold for over $1,900 a foot--and that would mean it will set a new price-per-foot record for American office buildings. That distinction currently belongs to 450 Park Avenue, which traded last year for just under $1,600 a foot.

Ironically enough, 450 Park stands next to a development site owned by Harry Macklowe, the GM Building's embattled owner.  read more »

Even businessmen at the GM Building this afternoon were unaware of the tower's impending sale by owner Harry Macklowe, which doesn't quite signal stellar newspaper consumption levels in New York.

A group of smokers outside had no idea; but even if the building is sold (bids are due tomorrow), one man said, his firm has a 10-year lease so it makes no difference. Without breaking his purposeful stride to lunch another, Wall Street type shouted over his shoulder, "I don't know anything about the sale, I'm just one of the investors involved."  read more »

I'm blogging from the Apple Store in the GM Building the day before bids are due for Harry Macklowe's gem at 767 Fifth Avenue. Aside from a photographer looming around, brandishing a press pass, it's business as usual here. The store is packed with tourists, teens, and that enigmatic breed of New Yorker which can afford to spend days frittering on laptops or attending matinees.

Employees at the Apple Store, one of Mr. Macklowe's prime retail tenants, seem equally oblivious to the drawn-out saga that will race toward culmination tomorrow.  read more »

Everyone knows Harry Macklowe's selling the GM Building to raise money to pay off his debts. The bids for the iconic tower are due tomorrow, and one of the enticements Mr. Macklowe offers bidders is the prospect of rebranding the 50-story tower at the southeast corner of Central Park. The New York Times reports this morning that General Motors' contractual naming rights for the tower expire in 2010.  read more »

Talks continue between Harry Macklowe and his creditors over the $7 billion in debt he owes connected to his purchase of seven Manhattan buildings last February. Otherwise, no new news to report this morning.

But my colleague, Eliot Brown, has a story in today's Observer about Mort Zuckerman's coy interest in Mr. Macklowe's GM Building, which he put on the market in January as a possible way to pay off some of the debt.

Harry Macklowe has been served a default notice, according to reports, and could face foreclosure on some of the seven Manhattan buildings he bought last winter for $7 billion. Mr. Macklowe could not reach an agreement with some lenders to get an extension on $3.1 billion in debt on four of the buildings.

He has apparently reached a deal with his primary lender, Deutsche Bank, on $5.8 billion of the debt that involves him turning over control of the seven buildings while retaining the titles.  read more »

Harry Macklowe is in default, according to reports. The landlord owed Deutsche Bank on Saturday $5.8 billion for a loan he took last winter to buy seven Manhattan office buildings for $7 billion. Mr. Macklowe is reportedly still in talks with the bank and a group of subordinate lenders on a repayment plan, but he's technically in default on the loan, according to sources quoted by the Wall Street Journal.  read more »

We've all been following the travails of Harry Macklowe, the mighty landlord who entered 2007 with a big-bang buy of seven Manhattan office buildings for $7 billion. A year later, Mr. Macklowe owes his lenders on the deal $7 billion (though some reports put the amount at $6.4 billion) and the bill's due tomorrow.  read more »

Bloomberg News is reporting that Harry Macklowe plans to sell the GM Building this month. Bids for the 50-story building, arguably the world's most valuable, are due on Feb. 15. And Mr. Macklowe owes billions to his creditors by Feb. 9 (or they need to give him an extension by that date).

So the timing for a multi-billion-dollar sale of the GM Building at 767 Fifth Avenue would not be more opportune for the embattled Mr.  read more »

The Wall Street Journal this morning lays out the stakes for Harry and Billy Macklowe. Bottom line, they owe billions to Deutsche Bank and hedge fund Fortress Investment. They used the billions to finance the epic $7 billion purchase of seven Manhattan office buildings one year ago this month.

Now, the bills are due something awful and the Macklowes may face the disappearance of much of their hard-won empire:  read more »

Developer Larry Silverstein publicly professed his love for Harry Macklowe’s GM Building today, though was mum on whether he is interested in buying a stake—or all—of Mr. Macklowe’s prized tower at 767 Fifth Avenue.

“I think the General Motors building is perhaps one of New York’s finest buildings—it’s a gem, it’s a trophy,” he told a gaggle of reporters at this morning’s Downtown Alliance breakfast.  read more »

We got the new issue of Real Estate Weekly today. The full-page ad on the back (right) from Kennedy Funding struck us initially as a remarkably tasteless play on the remarkably tasteless Golfweek cover earlier this month.

Then we read the ad.

You need millions. You have to close in 2 weeks. All other lenders already said no. Don't worry, there's a better alternative.  read more »

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It's been almost one full week since the news broke that Macklowe Properties was marketing the GM Building at 767 Fifth Avenue, arguably the most valuable building on Earth.

We couldn't help but dig up something that Billy Macklowe said to The Observer's John Koblin back in February, after he and his father Harry bought eight New York buildings (not including the GM) for $7 billion:

'Dad and I like to move quickly. Time kills all deals.'

We're tempted to wax hyperbolic about the potential sale by Harry Macklowe of the GM Building, so, what the heck, we will: It could fetch a truly historic record, perhaps becoming the biggest single biggest building sale of our lifetimes (and the average age of The Observer's real estate desk is 27.5 right now).

Here's the quick math first, then the historical benchmarks. Most top-flight office towers in New York trade now for at least $1,000 a square foot.  read more »