Expert says developer Lev Leviev has little chance of winning on appeal
Lev Leviev and the District at 111 Fulton Street (building source: PropertyShark)In a landmark ruling, a federal district court judge ruled that developer Lev Leviev must return deposits to three buyers at the District condominium after he failed to register the prope [more]
From the December issue: At peak, buyers of 55 out of 108 units (51 percent) at the 505 at 505 West 47th Street had cases in federal court to rescind their contracts, which were worth a combined $43.1 million. Six have since dropped their cases, and three have closed on their units (one received a 3.5 percent discount). The plaintiffs claimed Parkview, headed by Ian Reisner and Mati Weiderpass, failed to provide the property report required under the Interstate Land Sales Full Disclosure Act. After Parkview realized its mistake, the buyers claim it filed an amendment to the offering plan in an attempt to exempt itself from the law by removing eight units and combining another two, so the initial offering plan would only be comprised of 99 units. Developers across the city are fighting to keep buyers in contracts — but 20 condos and co-ops are facing a particularly tough time. Click here to read about the rest.
From the October issue: New condos — the black sheep of the real estate industry for much of 2009 — are finally beginning to move again as construction progresses and developers find ways to circumvent stiff presale requirements for mortgages. For example, the Tempo condominium in Gramercy, which sat virtually buyerless for months after it went on sale in September 2008, sold 10 units this summer. In Lower Manhattan, District on Fulton Street sold 10 units in August alone. The Fairchild at 55 Vestry Street in Tribeca, which had sold only one unit in April and none in February or March, put five units in contract in August and even saw a bidding war, the developer said. “Deals are getting done at new developments,” said Stephen McArdle, the principal of brokerage Urban Marketing, which is handling sales at District. “We’re seeing activity. Six months ago you weren’t seeing anything. The fact that the bottleneck is open is very encouraging.”
A few months after switching marketing firms from now-defunct JC DeNiro & Associates to Brown Harris Stevens, District’s developers have made another change, this time to Urban Marketing, a new division of brokerage Urban Sanctuary. Switching sales and marketing firms has become a common response from developers to slowing sales amid the recession. District, a 163-unit condominium at 111 Fulton Street, is currently over 70 percent sold out, said Stephen McArdle, a partner at Urban Marketing. [more]
From the December issue: Some real estate ads shouldn’t be left
lying on a coffee table when there are young children around. That’s
because real estate developers know sex sells — and they are
increasingly marketing their projects with explicit sexual images, or
at least sexual undertones, even at the risk of offending older buyers.
Spicy advertising has picked up in frequency in New York City in the
last few years, as the number of units coming online has increased and
developers have sought ways to distinguish themselves. At the William
Beaver House in the Financial District, there was a backlash against
ads that were deemed too racy. [more]
