Jason and Josh Muss

Jason Muss, the 41-year-old heir apparent of his family’s real estate business, is steering the firm towards Manhattan residential and commercial projects, rather than the outer boroughs development the company is known for, the Wall Street Journal reported.

For example, Muss Development has acquired the near-fully leased office building at 64 West 48th Street, a fully leased office property at 87th Street and Third Avenue and a luxury rental located at 119th Street and Third Avenue in East Harlem. [more]

From left: FEMA’s Craig Fugate and Forest Hills Tower (credit: PropertyShark)

The Federal Emergency Management Agency has inked a 200,000-square-foot lease at Forest Hills Tower in Queens for its New York City headquarters, according to a release from Muss Development, the landlord of the property. The lease encompasses 10 full floors that will be used by FEMA for administrative office space.

The lease spans the next several months, as the area recovers from the devastation left by Hurricane Sandy, and has options for short-term extensions. The financial terms of the deal were not mentioned. [more]

64 West 48th Street (credit: PropertyShark)

Weight Watchers has secured a lease for almost 3,000 square feet of space at 64 West 48th Street between Fifth and Sixth avenues, according to a press release issued today. The group will move into their new 14th floor digs by the end of May. The asking rent was not disclosed.

Weight Watchers currently occupies the 5th floor of the building in a temporary space until the 14th floor is ready for occupancy. Weight Watchers already has four other locations around Manhattan, from Midtown down to Noho. [more]

Queens-based landlord Muss Development is searching for a new tenant to fill 200,000 square feet of Class A space at 118-35 Queens Boulevard in Forest Hills, the current headquarters of JetBlue Airways, Crain’s reported. The airline will be moving out of the property late this year and relocating to Long Island City.
Muss is asking $35 per square foot for space, though the rent could be subsidized by various incentive programs, including the city’s Relocation and Employee Assistance Program and exemption from the city’s commercial real estate occupancy tax, Crain’s said, bringing it to $20 per square foot.
Jones Lang LaSalle is marketing the space on behalf of Muss. Consolidated Edison, the New York Times, the Daily News and several law firms are also tenants of the 310,000-square-foot building. [Crain's]

Time is running out for the holdouts in Queens’ Willets Point, where the city is planning to make its first move towards seizing a 20-acre swath of land through eminent domain next week. According to the Wall Street Journal, the parcel represents the first phase of the 62-acre development project, for which the city will begin soliciting bids from developers in April. Among the developers who have previously expressed interest in the project are the Related Companies, Muss Development and the Wilpon Family’s Sterling Equities. … [more]

The city is planning to relinquish around 37,000 square feet of ground- and second-floor space in the Brooklyn Municipal Building to retail or development companies who would help transform the corner of Joralemon and Court streets into a shopping destination. The borough has been lobbying for such a plan for months, and today the Wall Street Journal reported that the city is accepting sale and leasing proposals for the space, with an official announcement expected today.

A study commissioned by the Downtown Brooklyn Partnership recently found that the first two floors and the basement of 210 Joralemon Street could be worth $20 million in a sale for retail use…. [more]

A rendering of Sky View Parc, attorney Adam Leitman Bailey

Dozens of buyers at Queens’ Sky View Parc, the massive new condominium and shopping center in Flushing, filed a lawsuit yesterday in an attempt to renege on their contracts and get their deposits back from the developers, the Wall Street Journal reported. The complaint, filed by attorney Adam Leitman Bailey, makes use of a 1968 federal law known as the Interstate Land Sales Full Disclosure Act, which requires developers of large buildings to provide full disclosure to protect buyers from corruption. In the wake of the real estate crash, a surge in condo buyers’ remorse has put Bailey at the forefront of a number of similar efforts to try to help buyers get out of their obligations, but the complaint at Sky View Parc is the largest of its kind thus far.
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New hotels are cropping up in unexpected places, according to the Wall Street Journal, in response to a growing demand for more affordable accommodations around Manhattan. Among the new hotels in the pipeline are a Yankee Stadium-adjacent Days Inn, a Crowne Plaza set for Long Island City and a Holiday Inn Express with a 2012 opening date in the Bronx. Joshua Muss, principal with Muss Development, said that, in the past, building full-service hotels outside Manhattan was “unthinkable.” Today, Muss said, areas like Downtown Brooklyn, where the MetroTech Center is a major draw, have numerous overnight options. “Who would have thought that at first there were no hotels [in the area] and now there are 30 within a mile or two?” Muss said. [WSJ]

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Rendering of Sky View Parc

[Update: 11:42 a.m.] Two big-box retailers are set to open their doors this week at Flushing’s new Sky View Parc complex. A new 180,000-square-foot Target will open to the public tomorrow morning at 8 a.m., a spokesperson for the retailer confirmed to… [more]

The developer of Flushing’s massive Sky View Parc mixed-use complex is shopping for nearly $150 million in financing to complete the first phase of its delayed condo and retail project, which is already over budget, according to the Post. Onex Real Estate Partners, the general partner for the 1,000-unit, 15-acre development, wants a three-year extension on its $519.3 million construction loan, plus an additional $144.6 million. The deal is likely to be reached within weeks, sources said. Other sources said that Onex and the Related Companies, which was brought in a few months ago to replace Muss Development in its sales and leasing roles, have also offered to buy out the project’s debt at a 50 percent discount, in a deal that would require Related to put in some of its own equity. [Post]

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