Mo Vaughn
As expected, former Mets baseball player Maurice “Mo” Vaughn’s real estate company Omni New York won the auction this afternoon for 14 troubled properties in the Bronx, a spokesperson for the state court system said. Omni bought $23.8 million in debt for about $5 million last year, and today won the properties in an auction in the Bronx County Courthouse. TRD
Omni New York, the affordable housing management company led by former New York Mets player Mo Vaughn, has just bought two more low-income housing complexes, according to Crain’s. The two Bedford-Stuyvesant housing centers, the Dr. Betty Shabazz complex and the Medgar Evers Houses, contain a total of approximately 470 units. Omni plans to launch a $10 million renovation effort there, which is slated to be complete by the end of 2011. The company successfully bid on 14 troubled South Bronx buildings at the end of 2009 and made its first purchase in Manhattan — a $5.5 million affordable housing building at 2059-71 Madison Avenue in Harlem — in January this year.
Crain’s has released its latest list of New York City power players, the top “40 Under 40,” and it comes as no surprise that real estate moguls are sprinkled throughout. Among those of note are Seth Pinsky, president of the city’s Economic Development Corp., who barely made the list at 39 years old, and Alexandra Prosser, 29, a managing director at eEmerge, an office leasing division of commercial real estate giant SL Green Realty. Pinsky, of the EDC, had a hand in some of the city’s most talked about projects of the decade, including the World Trade Center, Atlantic Yards and the new Yankees and Mets stadiums. Also included was Scott Weiner, Apollo Global Real Estate’s 36-year-old principal. After joining the asset manager last year, he started Apollo Commercial Real Estate and recently took the company public. Eugene Schneur, 37, the Omni New York co-founder and managing director, made the list as well. Schneur and his company buy and rehabilitate affordable housing units across New York, New Jersey and Connecticut using low-income tax credits and tax-exempt bond financing. Omni recently made headlines when it bought the mortgage on a distressed 14-building complex in the South Bronx. [Crain's]
More rent-stabilized buildings could be facing foreclosure, with some already in default, due to property owners overpaying for properties, WNYC reported. Most notable is Tishman Speyer and Black Rock Realty’s purchase of Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village. Other cases include the sale of Ocelot’s 14 troubled Bronx buildings to Omni New York, headed by former Mets first baseman Mo Vaughn.
“I think what we’ve learned through this crisis is that that pot of gold isn’t there and that owners really need to understand the rent regulation system, they need to understand local markets that they’re buying buildings in and that lenders that are making those loans need to reflect those conditions in their underwriting,” said Department of Housing Preservation and Development Commissioner Rafael Cestero. [WNYC]
