Fiona Kelly has joined Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson‘s real
estate practice as a corporate partner, the company announced in a
statement today. She will be responsible for expanding Fried Frank’s
offerings across its global real estate network, and advising
multinational financial institutions, investment funds, sovereign
wealth funds, developers and investors on joint ventures, acquisitions
and disposals of interests in private and public companies. – Miranda Neubauer [more]

From left: the Printing House condo and Taconic co-CEOs Paul Pariser and Charles Bendit

[Updated at 5:05 p.m. with information on who the developers were in talks with] Taconic Investment Partners has filed a $4.38 million lawsuit against the developers of the West Village’s Printing House condominium, alleging they were used as a “stalking-horse bidder” on a deal to buy 104 unsold units, when the true intent was to find a more lucrative deal.

Taconic, in a suit filed in Manhattan Supreme Court April 18, alleges that the developers, Mountbatten Equities, led by investors Winthrop Chamberlin and Barnet Liberman, offered the units at 421 Hudson Street for $77 million, but allegedly moved on to another bidder, after several weeks of negotiations.

“During the negotiations, defendants and Mountbatten’s exclusive agent represented to Taconic that all material terms had been agreed to and Mountbatten was committed to consummating a deal with plaintiffs,” wrote Taconic’s attorney, Janice Mac Avoy of Fried Frank, who alleged in court papers that Taconic was preparing to close the deal. “In fact,” she wrote, “defendants did not have any intention of selling the condominium units to plaintiff.” [more]

Investor Aby Rosen and 400 Park Avenue (building photo source: PropertyShark)

Waterman Interests, a closely held real estate investment firm led by Philip Waterman, said it [more]

The Real Deal had a contingent of reporters and editors at the New York Hilton for the Real Estate Board of New York’s annual banquet and awards ceremony (click here to see an article on the event). The Real Deal’s Web editor Lauren Elkies interviewed a slew of real estate bigwigs from Bill Rudin of Rudin Management — who said Jonathan Mechanic of Fried, Frank (who The Real Deal also spoke to) is “the real deal” — to Bruce Mosler of Cushman & Wakefield — who said he loves The Real Deal, to Frederick Peters of Warburg Realty — who said “Virtual Office Web sites,” or VOWS, “will ultimately be insignificant.” [more]

Two years ago, demand for air rights was, well, through the roof. “For residential use at the peak of the market, [air rights] were between $400 and $500 a square foot,” said Stuart Siegel, executive managing director at commercial real estate firm Grubb & Ellis.

The rights, often called development rights by those in the industry, were being traded by everyone from real estate giants like the Related Companies to small-time developers. The goal: to erect ever-taller buildings, with which to pull in more income.

Stephen Lefkowitz, a partner at Fried Frank, which handled the transfer of several hundred thousand square feet of air rights from the St. Thomas Church on Fifth Avenue to the MoMa Tower to be built at 53 West 53rd Street, noted that at the time sales for air rights were “very active.” more