From left: REBNY President Steven Spinola, Rep. Anthony Weiner, Warburg President Frederick Peters, Elaine Mayers of Citi Habitats and Stacey Max of Bellmarc Realty

Tuesday’s approval of an amendment to a proposed Federal Housing Finance Agency ruling dealing with flip taxes could keep lenders from abandoning the New York City residential market in the future, according to industry experts.

The amendment pared down an earlier FHFA provision, announced in fall 2010, which would have barred government-sponsored Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac from lending in all multi-family buildings in which a flip tax is written into the contract. In its original form, the proposal could have adversely affected roughly 50 percent of the New York City residential stock, according to Real Estate Board of New York President Steven Spinola.

The amendment was passed as part of a larger proposal that is still winding its way through the approval process. [more]

Andrew Barrocas

From the May issue: While the real estate community is inundated with statistics about sales activity and prices when it comes to the condo and co-op market, there’s one stat that’s rarely bandied about in public: commission fluctuations. In this month’s Q & A, The Real Deal talked to brokers and firm principals about how take-home pay and commissions have changed since the market went into freefall in September 2008. For more on the new types of commission splits that some firms are using and on new development versus resale commissions, we turn to our panel of experts. [more]

(Clockwise from left) Brokers Richard Steinberg, Steve Kliegerman, Stacey Max, and Victoria Shtainer talk about real estate priorities post-election.

New construction helped define the legacy of Michael Bloomberg’s first two terms as mayor, whether it was parks, schools, apartments, or more controversial mega-projects. That came in lockstep with a wholesale reordering of what should go where in New York, as Bloomberg rezoned 20 percent of the city, which was the most in four decades. But in Bloomberg’s third term, which he won yesterday in a close election against city Comptroller William Thompson, the city’s real estate community seems focused on different issues — some more far-reaching than others.
Some brokers hope lessons have been learned, like with the Second Avenue Subway, whose famously disruptive construction has hurt sales at the Upper East Side’s Georgica condo, said Richard Steinberg, an executive managing director with Warburg Realty Partnership. [more]