From left: Edward Mermelstein and TRD Publisher Amir KorangyIs the housing market bound to correct itself, or does it need government guidance to get back in the right direction? That’s the question at the center of the debate over President Barack Obama’s Home Affordable Refinance Plan, which gives underwater homeowners wider access to the market’s low interest rates.

“What we’ve learned over the last couple of years is regardless of the regulation that’s put out to either force the banks to lend more or to loosen the regulatory measures, it hasn’t shown to have worked,” Edward Mermelstein, a New York City real estate developer and a partner and co-founder of law firm Rheem Bell & Mermelstein, told Multi-Housing News. “Let the market correct itself … the less interference that’s provided, the quicker that’s going to happen.” [more]

From left: Costas Kondylis signing a “Building Stories” book at the PBS screening, Kondylis and Norma Foerderer of the Trump Organization and Kondylis with The Real Deal Publisher and “Building Stories” Producer Amir Korangy

PBS picked up The Real Deal’s documentary on prolific architect Costas Kondylis for its 2012 documentary series, and last week celebrated with The Real Deal by holding a private screening at 1 Bryant Park Tower in Midtown.

Like the movie premiere in May, the PBS screening attracted many notable real estate bigwigs, including Halstead Property President Diane Ramirez, Peebles Chairman Don Peebles and many other friends and colleagues of Costas Kondylis (see more photos after the jump). — Adam Fusfeld [more]

From the September issue: When you have a baby, you are afraid they are going to get into your medicine cabinet or accidentally roll off the bed. You have to keep a close watch. Even when that baby grows up, as a parent you are still afraid they’re going to get hurt.
That’s the way I feel about my one-year-old daughter, Sophie, and it’s also the way I feel about The Real Deal.

Even though it’s reaching a milestone moment this month with its 100th issue, I still worry about the stray typo or flat headline that is going to jeopardize the magazine’s survival
and consign it to the dustbin for readers.

Those heightened fears stem from the very early days of the magazine, back in 2003, when it was headquartered out of founder (and publisher) Amir Korangy’s apartment. As The Real Deal‘s only other full-time employee (alongside part-time ad man Yoav Barilan, now our director of marketing operations), I knew we had only a few chances to get it right before we would lose readers’ attention, run out of money, or both.
So for me, this issue is a great celebration of the magazine’s resilience. [more]

From the September issue: In its eight years of publication, The Real Deal has covered the real estate industry in a city that’s been transformed by a massive building boom, was crippled by the subsequent bust, and is now in the midst of a tentative recovery.
The compendium of stories we’ve written runs the gamut from the record-setting building and apartment purchases during the boom, to the toppling of mega-developers during the bust, to new entrepreneurs trying to get into the real estate game during today’s fragile recovery. This month, for the anniversary of our 100th issue, we bring you some of the most compelling stories we’ve tracked in these pages, many of which have unfolded and evolved over time, much as the magazine itself has. And watch the video below to see The Real Deal Publisher Amir Korangy talk about the special process for creating the unique 100th issue cover.
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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]

Images from “Building Stories” include, clockwise from top left, Costas Kondylis, Kondylis-designed Riverside South, Donald Trump, Richard Meier and Larry Silverstein

Manhattan’s most prolific architect will get the big-screen treatment in the premier of a new documentary by The Real Deal tonight.

The film, “Building Stories,” about the career of architect Costas Kondylis, who has added more than 86 towers to the New York skyline yet has remained relatively unknown to the general public, is airing as part of an invite-only event at the Morgan Library in Midtown.

Developer Donald Trump, who has hired Kondylis for many of his buildings, is slated to introduce the film. Renowned New York journalist and novelist Peter Hamill will also give a talk. The event is expected to draw more than 750 people. TRD [more]

Amir Korangy, publisher of The Real Deal

This month marks the eight-year anniversary of The Real Deal. The publication has grown from a three-person team working out of Publisher Amir Korangy’s apartment to a 28-person company with modern digs at 158 West 29th Street. As the Los Angeles Times wrote in a profile on the company, The Real Deal has become the must-read for real estate insiders.” That is evident in its reach to more than 130,000 readers in print and over 500,000 visitors online monthly. Besides subscribers and online visitors, the magazine is distributed at newstands throughout the city, to lobbies in the city’s most exclusive apartment and office buildings as well as in first and business class
cabins on four of the country’s largest airlines. TRD [more]

At The Real Deal’s 6th Annual Forum at Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall last Wednesday, Sharif El-Gamal, chairman and CEO of Manhattan-based real estate investment firm Soho Properties, fielded questions from The Real Deal’s Amir Korangy about his Park51 project. El-Gamal is the developer of Park51, a community center and Islamic prayer space planned two blocks from the World Trade Center site. This is the second in a three-part video series covering the forum, which included a panel discussion featuring some of the industry’s biggest players. See the [more]

Earlier this week, a federal bankruptcy court ruled in Donald Trump’s favor when it rejected a takeover plan of Trump Entertainment Resorts in Atlantic City by billionaire investor Carl Icahn. The three casinos in question are emerging from their third bankruptcy, and Icahn made an ostensibly better offer: $486 million and the elimination of all of the company’s debt, versus the $225 million and $1.4 billion reduction in debt proposed by Trump. But Trump had something Icahn didn’t — the name. And he was threatening to pull it from the casinos if Icahn took the helm. As The Real Deal publisher Amir Korangy put it, bearing the Trump brand is “like having the name Awesome… he’s taken it to real estate, fashion, publishing, production, spirits/liquors, resorts, casinos and TV.” Now that the ubiquitous Trump brand has succeeded in winning him back his casinos, will it pay off? [Philadelphia Inquirer]

HGTV’s new realty reality show, “Selling New York,” premiers tonight at 9 p.m., promising to showcase the “top of the real estate food chain.” The show follows Gumley Haft Kleier’s Michele Kleier and her broker daughters, Samantha Kleier Forbes and Sabrina Kleier Morgenstern, as well as Core’s Shaun Osher, among other brokers from each firm as they maneuver their way through some of the city’s most high-end real estate transactions. In honor of the debut, The Real Deal did some digging to find out which of the city’s prized properties are slated to be featured this season. Among them: a four-bedroom loft at the Chelsea Mercantile listed for $22.45 million, the 25 Murray Street loft for which former Giants star Michael Strahan is asking $1.85 million, a $17 million landmarked townhouse at 109 East 69th Street, and a 2,295-square-foot spread at highly-anticipated One Brooklyn Bridge Park (see slide show of many of the homes above). Click here for more information about the residences expected to appear in the upcoming season.
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