Paul Ballew, chief economist of Nationwide Mutual Insurance, accompanied attorney Adam Leitman Bailey on CNBC yesterday to diagnose the state of the housing recovery. Each of their statements proved grimmer than the last. Bailey started by noting the three markets, the well-performing luxury market, the muddling lower market that could be damaged by the conforming loan limit and the foreclosure market, which he said may not be sorted through for another five years. Comments

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Following a huge legal victory for Park51, the Islamic community center near Ground Zero, attorney Adam Leitman Bailey appeared on Fox News (see video above) to talk construction costs. The attorney, who defended Park 51 developer Sharif El-Gamal against a lawsuit from former New York City firefighter Timothy Brown, said the developer still does not have the money to build the mosque. “Knocking it down doesn’t cost a lot of money,” he said of the demolition of the former Burlington coat factory at the site, “but building it does.”

Bailey said architects anticipate construction will cost around $17 millon, but political commentator Bill O’Reilly argued that figure was much too low. O’Reilly continued to criticize Bailey and the Park51 developers, calling them insensitive to the families of Sept. 11 victims. [more]

From left: Real Estate attorney Adam Leitman Bailey, 372 Central Park West, 360 East 88th Street and 215 East 80th Street

Condominium boards may not possess the power to reject prospective buyers as their co-op counterparts do, but they’ve devised a new way to gain some control over who buys: extensive paperwork. The New York Times reported that an increasing number of condo boards are requiring buyers to complete dozens of pages of financial information, including two years worth of tax returns, income statements, bank statements and even personal and business references. “It is a bullying strategy — condominium bullying,” said Adam Leitman Bailey, a Manhattan real estate lawyer. [more]

The developer of the Lotus condominium in Williamsburg has agreed to hand over 10 apartments to the condo board, settling a private lawsuit and investigation by the attorney general amid complaints about structural defects at the building and thousands of dollars in unpaid common charges.

Developer Steven Kohn signed a “confession of judgment” at Attorney General Eric Schneiderman’s office June 3, giving the 10 unsold apartments to the condo board, according to documents obtained by The Real Deal. The board will be able to rent out the units to help cover the costs of fixing the building. The developer also signed a personal guarantee, backing up promises made in the settlement. [more]

A settlement will give buyers who backed out of contracts on $50 million worth of luxury apartments in Flushing’s $1 billion Sky View Parc complex a 75 percent refund on their $5 million down payments, the New York Post reported. The arrangement will recoup $3.69 million plus interest for 118 buyers. Adam Leitman Bailey, the lawyer who represented the buyers, called the decision “the largest [Interstate Land Sales Act] settlement on record in New York.”

The buyers filed suit last year, making use of a 1968 federal law known as the Interstate Land Sales Full Disclosure Act, which requires condo sponsors to register their project with the Department of Housing and Urban Development and provide full disclosure to protect buyers from corruption. [more]

Manhattan House and attorney Peter Axelrod

The developer of the Upper East Side’s Manhattan House condominium suffered a major blow in the long-awaited eviction trial of 17 market-rate tenants yesterday when a housing court judge disqualified their legal counsel for failing to disclose that one of their lawyers previously represented one of the defendants against the condo.

Housing Court Judge Brenda Spears ruled that Axelrod, Fingerhut & Dennis could no longer represent Manhattan House, because Peter Axelrod, one of the law partners defending the developer, failed to disclose that he had previously represented defendant Susan Tosk, in a 2007 case involving the replacement of her windows at the 200 East 66th Street tower, and had inside information that was relevant to the current case. [more]

From the May issue: Real estate attorney Adam Leitman Bailey’s debut book, “Finding the Uncommon Deal,” doles out advice on all stages of buying a house, condo or co-op. Yet the author’s ambitions are broader than just a how-to guide to homeownership. “My life, my business and my legal practice have been dedicated to real estate and attempting to make the United States a better place to live by advocating for better real estate decisions,” Bailey, the energetic and frenetic founder of Manhattan-based residential and commercial law firm Adam Leitman Bailey, PC, writes in the preface. The 230-page paperback from John Wiley & Sons was published in the middle of last month, and shot to No. 1 on the New York Times list of paperback advice and how-to books. (However, the ranking noted that bookstores had been receiving bulk orders for the title.) [more]

From left: Architect Costas Kondylis and Princess Katherine Karadjordjevic, developer Donald Trump, the Corcoran Group’s Pamela Liebman, Town’s Andrew Heiberger and wife Robyn, and marketing guru Louise Sunshine (credit: Clint Spaulding of patrickmcmullan.com). Click the image to see more photos.

Developer Donald Trump, who spent weeks courting the fringes of American politics in a possible presidential bid, stuck to real estate last night in brief remarks at the premier of a documentary produced by The Real Deal about the prolific and aging New York architect Costas Kondylis. (See more photos after the jump.)

Trump, who traveled the United States questioning President Barack Obama’s birth certificate, praised Kondylis — born in Africa to Greek parents — as a “great design architect.”

Kondylis was the architect on many of Trump’s buildings such as the Trump World Tower at 845 United Nations Plaza and an imposing row of residential towers that were critically panned called Riverside South, which face the Hudson River. [more]

Lenz speaks on Fox News this week

New York real estate attorney Adam Leitman Bailey declared that the housing market has another five years to go before recovery, on Fox News’ “America Live with Megyn Kelly” earlier this week. Bailey, who appeared on a panel with Dolly Lenz of Prudential Douglas Elliman and Liz MacDonald of Fox Business Network, was reacting to the latest home price report from Zillow.com, which sent shockwaves through the industry with its prediction that the U.S. housing market won’t bottom out until 2012. “It doesn’t make any sense to me why anyone has thought that we were close to the bottom,” Bailey said. “We can’t be.” [more]

Manhattan-based real estate brokerage BP Vance will no longer rent and sell apartments to and for individuals, founder and attorney Adam Leitman Bailey told The Real Deal today. The company will exclusively focus on brokering deals for its existing corporate client base, starting next month.

This change in focus is about playing to the company’s big income clients and comes as a result of the demand for experts to navigate pre-foreclosures and other distressed property opportunities, according to Bailey, who started the company in 1997, naming it after his grandparents Bob and Paula Vance. “It’s a matter of math,” Bailey said. “If you’re making a lot of money one way, you may as well stick to that formula.” [more]