From left: Drew Greenwald, president of Grid Properties, developer Trevor Davis and 1055 Park Avenue

A Manhattan real estate executive filed a lawsuit against Trevor Davis’ 1055 Park Avenue condominium project, alleging the developer reneged on a critical $5 million deal to sell him a luxury apartment, just days after the executive vouched for Davis before a U.S. bankruptcy court judge.

In a complaint filed in Manhattan Supreme Court last Thursday, Drew Greenwald, president of Harlem-based Grid Properties, alleges breach of contract and asked the court to order Davis Development to proceed with the closing by tomorrow’s deadline.

Greenwald alleges that after luring him into signing a purchase agreement for the four-bedroom apartment, Greenwald’s lawyers vouched for the deal before Judge Shelley Chapman in Davis’ personal bankruptcy case, allowing the developer to complete sales at the project. [more]

Five glass-walled condominium units at 1055 Park Avenue and 87th Street have sold despite a long and difficult struggle by developer Trevor Davis, the Wall Street Journal reported. The buyers all closed this past Friday upon orders from a bankruptcy judge, as the building worked out a foreclosure threat. The final, and sixth, apartment will close in the next couple of weeks for more than $5 million, court records reveal. The condo units, in a narrow 12-story glass tower designed by Kohn Pederson Fox Associates, were not well received by neighbors. Davis bought the site in 2005 and struggled to complete it, eventually filing for bankruptcy in December of last year. The bankruptcy court dictated that all five condos be sold on the same day, providing the $18.2 million needed to pay off the first mortgage. [more]

Trevor Davis and 1055 Park Avenue

A U.S. Bankruptcy Court judge yesterday approved a plan by developer Trevor Davis to resume selling
apartments at his troubled condominium project, 1055 Park Avenue, on the Upper East Side. The ruling by Judge Shelley Chapman should help resolve more than six months of legal battles between Davis and his lenders, who were about to foreclose on the troubled condominium in late December, when Davis suddenly filed for personal bankruptcy protection.

“It should help him resolve some of his financial problems and probably come out of Chapter 11,” attorney
Scott Markowitz told The Real Deal. [more]

Lawyers for developer Trevor Davis today urged a U.S. Bankruptcy Court judge to allow the sale of six condominium units at his troubled project at 1055 Park Avenue, claiming he has signed contracts for five units and expected to have the sixth and final contract signed next week.
According to court documents, Davis has an agreement with Miami-based real estate firm, New Valley, the 50 percent owner of the property’s broker, Prudential Douglas Elliman, to refinance the condo building.
“A condition of the refinance with New Valley is the simultaneous closing of at least one unit at the property other than the suite apartment,” Davis’ attorney Scott Markowitz wrote in court filings.
Davis filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy in December after Zimco Holdings, which acquired a $6 million loan on the property, planned to hold a foreclosure auction. [more]

949 Park Avenue

In the dreary world of New York City architecture, one is rarely surprised, let alone pleasantly surprised.
But so I was the other day when I passed a new building that has just arisen at 949 Park Avenue,
between 81st and 82nd streets. Designed by C3D Architecture, it is being developed by VE Equities
and marketed by Prudential Douglas Elliman.

This project is the latest and possibly the best of three similar buildings that have gone up on the east
side of Park Avenue between 81st and 87th streets in the past few years. The other two are 985
Park Avenue,
designed by Costas Kondylis, and
1055 Park Avenue, designed
by Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates. All three occupy a single lot, but rise to the canonic height, roughly
12 stories, of their neighbors. Whereas 1055 Park occupies the southeast corner of 87th street, the other two buildings are shoe-horned
in between two long-established structures. Comments

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Zimco Holdings, a creditor in the federal bankruptcy case of developer Trevor Davis, is urging the judge to allow court-supervised sales at 1055 Park Avenue, the luxury condominium building where it holds a $6 million loan, according to newly filed court documents.

In the documents filed today, Zimco asked Judge Shelly Chapman to allow sales to move forward, claiming that a pricing dispute with the building’s senior lender at 1055 Park Avenue at 87th Street is holding up potential deals.
“We‘d like the apartment sales to move forward,” Kevin Nash, lawyer for Zimco, told The Real Deal. “There’s an issue over current release prices. Under the mortgage documents the release prices are probably higher than what the market would bear.” [more]

Trevor DavisFrom the February issue: Trevor Davis could hardly be called shy, but the last few months have probably tested his stomach for public scrutiny. The down market hasn’t been kind to the gregarious, South African-born developer, known for hunting big game and taking on big, controversial projects. “He’s been a little quiet, actually,” said Dan Fasulo, managing director of research at Real Capital Analytics. “This downturn has been difficult for many local developers that didn’t have access to big institutional capital.” Much of Davis’s turmoil of late has sprung from 1055 Park Avenue, a luxury glass condo surrounded by rows of stately prewar co-ops. Its five apartments feature floor-to-ceiling glass enclosures that seem better fit for Soho or Chelsea than its neighborhood of Carnegie Hill. After a series of cuts, apartment prices range from $4.3 million to $7.5 million. [more]

The first of Trevor Davis’ five glassy condominiums at 1055 Park Avenue has gone into contract for under $4 million, or less than half of its original, $9.3 million asking price, according to the Wall Street Journal. That works out to less than $1,850 per square foot, which brokers consider to be a distressed price for that East 87th Street location. The price is also $1 million less than the minimum sales price set by lenders in mortgage documents signed last year. Comments

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From top: Trevor Davis, Dina Lewis and 1055 Park Avenue (building photo credit: PropertyShark)

Embattled developer Trevor Davis filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection yesterday in response to a threatened sale of the $6 million mezzanine loan on the nearly complete luxury condominium 1055 Park Avenue. Davis, who owns Davis Development Holdings, filed for personal bankruptcy, claiming mezzanine lender Zimco Holdings had taken unspecified “precipitous actions,” court papers filed this week show. He listed assets of $75 million and secured debts of $50 million, including from real estate he controls through limited liability companies. [more]

1055 Park and Trevor Davis

Lawyers for developer Trevor Davis are scheduled to appear in New York State Supreme Court tomorrow morning after filing suit to stop lenders from foreclosing on his condominium project at 1055 Park Avenue.

Davis filed suit Dec. 3 in New York State Supreme Court alleging the lender, Manhattan-based Zimco Holdings, plans to illegally foreclose on his six-unit property this Friday.

“Substantial interest has been expressed by potential purchasers of the condo units and given a reasonable period of time, [Davis] would be able to sell all six condominium units in the building and satisfy the Wrightwood loans and the Zimco loan,” according to the complaint. [more]