The Upper East Side girls’ prep school that has graduated the likes of Caroline Kennedy and Kyra Sedgwick won’t follow through with its expansion into the nearby apartment building it has been eyeing for the past four years, according to the Post. The Brearley School, at 610 East 83rd Street, had been angling to buy half the building at 85 East End Avenue, which is owned by BlackRock Realty, for use as additional teaching space. The plan would have evicted elderly, rent-regulated residents from the building, but sources said the school’s contract has fallen through. Brearley would not say why, but said it is still seeking to expand. BlackRock declined to comment. [Post]

From left: 1330 Avenue of the Americas, 527 Madison Avenue (Source: PropertyShark). The buildings were part of a portfolio of Anthracite loans on which BlackRock lost millions last year.

Struggling real estate investment trust Anthracite Capital filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy liquidation yesterday, the company announced. As Crain’s reported, the BlackRock affiliate, which made real estate loans and bought debt from other lenders, defaulted on its debt and was delisted from the New York Stock Exchange just a few months ago. Shareholders are not expected to recover anything, and any value recovered by unsecured creditors “would be minimal,” the firm said in a statement. BlackRock, a publicly-traded asset management firm based in Midtown, said last year that it expected to lose $53.2 million on two Anthracite loans for five present and former Macklowe Properties office buildings, including 1330 Avenue of the Americas, which Macklowe has since lost to foreclosure, and 527 Madison Avenue, which Macklowe sold. Richard Shea, Anthracite’s president and chief executive, is a managing director at BlackRock. TRD
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A hedge fund that owns much of the debt on distressed mega complex Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village filed papers in court this week to intervene in its already complicated foreclosure proceedings. The company, New Jersey-based Appaloosa Management, is objecting to the “irrational” and “imprudent” foreclosure action filed earlier this month by CW Capital Management. Foreclosure could cost debt holders up to $200 million in transfer taxes, and the company has said CW Capital should have pushed for former owners Tishman Speyer Properties and BlackRock Realty to go to bankruptcy court, instead. Tishman Speyer and BlackRock defaulted on their $3 billion mortgage at Stuyvesant Town in January and have since agreed to hand over the keys. Appaloosa owns more than $750 million in mortgages on the property. The company said it remains unclear whether it will be responsible, along with other debt holders, for more than $200 million in rent overcharges as a result of last year’s rent-stabilization ruling on 4,400 apartments there. [NYT]

Tenants at mega-complex Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village can try to buy the property if they want, but they shouldn’t count on the city to help them finance the deal, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said yesterday. “That’s not what we’re here to do. We want to make sure that whomever does take it over has a profitable deal,” he said. Tenants there have been said to be preparing a bid for the 110-building complex, where owners Tishman Speyer and BlackRock missed a $16 million loan payment in early January. Last week, creditors sued to force foreclosure. The Tishman Speyer-BlackRock partnership purchased the complex for $5.4 billion in 2006 after Bloomberg similarly denied tenants city aid in a bid to buy it. [NYDN]

Creditors have sued to force the struggling Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village complex into a foreclosure sale. Bank of America and U.S. Bank National Association, leading senior creditors with $3 billion in debt holdings on the 80-acre property, filed a complaint in federal court in New York yesterday, asking for approval to foreclose on the property and have it sold. Tishman Speyer and BlackRock had said last month that they would hand in the keys to the complex, which they purchased in 2006 for a staggering $5.4 billion, after missing a $16.1 million debt payment. That turnover has been delayed because of a debate over who would be responsible for the $90 million in property transfer taxes. Trustees requested in the complaint that they be able to use the proceeds from the sale to cover expenses including the mortgage, late charges, and exit and legal fees. The foreclosure process is likely to take 12 to 18 months, according to Fitch Ratings. [Bloomberg]

As Tishman Speyer prepares for a not-so-graceful exit from its Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village complex, Rose Associates has been appointed property manager for the transition period. Rose Associates had managed the complex for about four years back when it was rent-regulated and owned by MetLife, the company that sold it to a Tishman Speyer-led partnership for a whopping in $5.4 billion in 2006. Tishman Speyer announced last month that it would hand over the keys to Stuyvesant Town’s 110 buildings to creditors after missing a $16.1 million debt payment. Special servicer CW Capital Asset Management, which is now readying to take control of the property, announced in a joint statement with Tishman Speyer today that Rose Associates will work together with Tishman Speyer on a management transition plan. Who will pay the estimated $100 million transfer tax, however, is still up in the air. Though the fee is usually the responsibility of the party relinquishing control, the Tishman Speyer parternship has yet to step up to the plate.

Tishman Speyer Realty and BlackRock Realty agreed with tenants to permit the Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village lawsuit to proceed as a class action case, and also extended an interim agreement to lower rents until June, according to a joint statement from lawyers and the landlord. Under the agreement, tenants will continue to pay, until the end of June, the lower of either their existing rent or estimated rent-stabilized rents. Tenants will also be granted certain rights that exist under the city’s rent stabilization law, including rights to renew leases and family succession. After missing a $16.1 million interest payment, Tishman Speyer and BlackRock last month agreed to turn the 110-building complex over to creditors in a deed-in-lieu of foreclosure. The companies bought the complex in 2006 for $5.4 billion. Tenants won a landmark lawsuit alleging the landlord illegally deregulated apartments at the complex, which received J-51 tax benefits from the city. [more]

Donald Trump and Stuyvesant Town

Now that Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village owners Tishman Speyer and BlackRock Realty are out of the picture, some of the city’s biggest real estate names are vying for a stake in the 110-building complex, including one Donald Trump. Tishman Speyer and BlackRock announced earlier this week that they would hand over the debt-ridden property to creditors after missing a $16.1 million mortgage payment earlier this month. Since then, “people have asked us if we would get involved in running it or buying it,” Trump told the Post. “We are looking at it right now very seriously.” Trump isn’t the only one. WinnCompanies, the Boston-based apartment manager, is looking to dip its feet into the New York City market by taking on the property manager role at Stuy Town, and earlier this week, a high-profile group including investor Wilbur Ross, real estate mogul Richard LeFrak and investment firm Centerbridge Partners said they were interested in taking ownership. Rose Associates, the Related Companies and Prudential Douglas Elliman are also reportedly interested in a management role. Whoever owns the property next could be responsible for the $200 million in rent overcharges left over from October’s rent-stabilization ruling against Tishman Speyer, said Alex Schmidt, the tenants’ attorney in that case. [more]

Tishman Speyer and BlackRock Realty, the owners of Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village, are turning the 110-building complex over to creditors in a deed-in-lieu of foreclosure, the companies announced this morning. The partners went into default on the property after missing a $16.1 million debt payment earlier this month. The complex was purchased for $5.4 billion in 2006 in the most expensive single residential sale ever in the country and it has $4.4 billion in debt. The property is now worth an estimated $1.8 billion. Creditors had been threatening to move forward with foreclosure proceedings in recent weeks and to remove Tishman Speyer as property manager. “We make this decision as we feel a battle over the property or a contested bankruptcy proceeding is not in the long-term interest of the property, its residents, our partnership or the city,” Tishman and BlackRock said in a joint statement to the media. “Tishman Speyer would not consider a long-term management contract to
continue operating the property that does not involve ownership. Without a restructuring that would keep our ownership group as part of the equity, we felt it best that the new owners install a new management team.” Tishman Speyer itself invested only $112 million in the property; damage to the company’s reputation is likely to be more palpable in the aftermath of the soured deal. [WSJ]

Gramercy Capital, a Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village creditor, is pushing to remove Tishman Speyer Properties from its position as manager of the 80-acre property, which it bought with BlackRock Realty in 2006. Tishman and BlackRock had missed a $16.1 million debt payment earlier this month, which may have spurred Gramercy Capital to push for the replacement. The removal of Tishman as property manager would need to first be approved by CW Capital, special servicer for the senior portion of the debt. City Council member Daniel Garodnick said that any decision to change managers should take the comfort of the residents into account first. “If there is a change in management, we will want it to be seamless, without any disruption to tenants or reduction in service,” Garodnick said.