15 Leonard Street

The Landmarks Preservation Commission shot down developer Steven Schnall’s plans to build a nine-story condominium building at 15 Leonard Street in Tribeca, according to Curbed. Schnall had planned to replace two single-story parking garages with a building composed of a two-story glass base topped with five stories of steel residences and a two-story roof addition.

The developer intended to move his family into the two-story base and the cellar, to form a three-floor, 6,000-square-foot maisonette. Below that would be a commercial parking garage. The four lower levels of the five-story middle section would include full-floor, 2,600-square-foot apartments, while the top floor of the middle section and the rooftop addition would form a triplex penthouse. [more]

Steven Schnall

Developer Steven Schnall went before the Landmarks Committee of Manhattan Community Board 1 to present his plan for 11-15 Leonard Street last night, Curbed reported. The committee responded by issuing a resolution against the design.

The committee members had two main complaints: the building’s height and color. One member wants the facade to be brown in color, whereas another wished for a “warmer” grey, according to Curbed. There’s no specific mention of the complaints about the height. [more]

Steven Schnall and 11-15 Leonard Street (building credit: PropertyShark)

Steven Schnall, who famously flipped a Tribeca mansion he built for $24 million, has laid out the plans for his latest project. Schnall told the Tribeca Tribune that he plans to build a seven-story glass-encased residential building at 11-15 Leonard Street, which he acquired in August for $10 million from Clark Construction, public records show. [more]

The 11,000-square-foot mansion at 2 N. Moore Street in Tribeca wound up going for close to $24 million to financier Mark Zittman and his wife, Noelle, according to the Post. The revelation ends months of speculation over their identities since the listing went into contract earlier this year. The six-story, 65-foot-wide townhouse, originally listed for $35 million in 2008, has a 50-foot lap pool, three-car garage, staff apartment, library and media room. The current owners are television commercial producer Sherri Schnall and her husband, Steven, president of New York Mortgage Trust. The Corcoran Group’s Deborah Grubman and Carol Cohen had the listing. [Post]

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The 11,000-square-foot mansion at 2 N. Moore Street in Tribeca wound up going for close to $24 million to financier Mark Zittman and his wife, Noelle, according to the Post. The revelation ends months of speculation over their identities since the listing went into contract earlier this year. The six-story, 65-foot-wide townhouse, originally listed for $35 million in 2008, has a 50-foot lap pool, three-car garage, staff apartment, library and media room. The current owners are television commercial producer Sherri Schnall and her husband, Steven, president of New York Mortgage Trust. The Corcoran Group’s Deborah Grubman and Carol Cohen had the listing. [Post]

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Steven Schnall, founder of QuonticBank

Steven Schnall thinks that 1,000 community banks will close in the next year.

Even so, he’s confident the one he’s starting won’t.

Schnall, a mortgage finance expert who founded New York Mortgage Trust, has redesigned the erstwhile Golden First Bank in Great Neck under the name QuonticBank, with initial capitalization of $12 million to $13 million — half of which came out of his own pocket.

Despite his bleak community bank market outlook, Schnall said that smart lending will help his enterprise eschew failure. He said his background in mortgage financing was a key motivator in his decision to launch Quontic (“ontic” coming from the Greek word “ovtoc,” meaning factual existence, and “qu” being the prefix for the word “quality,” according to a Schnall spokesperson).

“The reason these banks are failing — in almost all cases — [is] bad loans,” Schnall said. “Our philosophy is, ‘we’re here to lend, but you have to be credit-worthy and you have to have skin in the game.’” [more]