A rendering of the Provost Square project

Toll Brothers is moving ahead with a 38-story apartment building in Jersey City, putting an end to the battle to keep the project from being developed in a local arts district, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The first phase of Provost Square is a $185 million, 420-unit project that Toll will break ground on this spring with an eye toward a 2015 move-in date. The complete project, located in Jersey City’s Powerhouse Arts District, will eventually have 925 condo and rental units, retail space, a 550-seat performing arts space and a pedestrian plaza.  [more]

From left: 1108 and 1110 Park Avenue

The construction of Toll Brothers’ white-glove condo building on Park Avenue is causing severe losses of light and views  at a neighboring co-op and bringing the older building’s prices down, the Wall Street Journal reported.

When complete, 1110 Park Avenue will be 210 feet tall and its 11 apartments will sport extra-high ceilings and tall windows, according to city filings viewed by the Journal. The apartments are expected to command prices north of $2,500 a square foot, David Von Spreckelsen, president of Toll’s New York-based City Living division, told the Journal.  [more]

Robert Toll

National development firms, including Toll Brothers and Lennar Corp., are hopping on the student housing bandwagon, in an effort to better withstand the next recession, the Wall Street Journal reported.

Toll is buying land near the University of Maryland, College Park and Penn State University to develop upscale student housing, while Lennar broke ground in February on an off-campus apartment community near the University of Texas at Austin. [more]

From left: David Von Spreckelsen of Toll Brothers and a project rendering

Pier 1 in Brooklyn Bridge Park is a project that its developers are putting on a pedestal — literally, the New York Post reported. Toll Brothers and Starwood Capital Group plan to raise their 550,000-square-foot complex at least 3 feet to protect it from the kind of flood damage that Hurricane Sandy did to the neighborhood. [more]

From left: David Von Spreckelsen, Kevin Esh, Ivan Hakimian and the King Street site

Toll Brothers has picked up a two-story West Soho parking garage, primed for redevelopment as a residential building, for $56.5 million, marking the second of two prospective condominium sites the national homebuilder picked up at the end of the year, sources told The Real Deal. [more]

From left: Izak Senbahar, David Von Spreckelsen and the stalled site

Developer Alexico Group has offloaded a troubled First Avenue development site, plans for which went belly-up as a result of the financial crisis.

The firm, which stalled several of its projects, including 56 Leonard Street, after the collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008, has sold another stalled site at 953-961 First Avenue, at East 53rd Street, to the homebuilder Toll Brothers, according to public records filed today with the city. The deal for the site, which closed December 28, was for $64 million. Cushman & Wakefield represented the seller in the transaction. [more]

Robert Toll and Robert Wolf

Although Robert Toll, executive chairman of developer Toll Brothers, predicts that Washington will not strike a last minute deal and that the nation is headed over the fiscal cliff, he still expects growth in the residential market. In an interview with Reuters Impact Players host Robert Wolf, Toll said after watching the market for more than 40 years that he expects home prices to climb 20 percent in 2013 and for the luxury market to continue to grow. (See the video after the jump)

Ara Hovnanian and Doug Yearley

Major U.S. home builders are urging President Barack Obama and House Speaker John Boehner to avoid the fiscal cliff even if it means adjusting tax rates, the Wall Street Journal reported. In a letter addressed to the two elected officials, CEOs of such companies as Toll Brothers and Hovnanian Enterprises voiced concerns that allowing the steep package of budget cuts and tax increases to take effect could shove the country back into a recession. [more]

Toll Brothers CEO Doug Yearley

Building off recent momentum, Pennsylvania-based builder Toll Brothers saw a $411.1 million profit in the fourth quarter, up a whopping 2,641 percent over the same period in 2011, HousingWire reported. The gain comes as new home contract signings soared year-over-year and the company nabbed a one-time tax benefit to the tune of $350 million.

The fourth quarter profit this year marks a significant jump from last year. The company last year posted a $15 million profit in the fourth quarter. There was also an increase in the amount of homes built in the fourth quarter — a total of 1,088, up 44 percent year-over-year. And with that comes contracts signed, which also saw a year-over-year gain of 75 percent, worth a total of $684.1 million. [more]

Martin Connor, CFO of Toll Brothers

Sales of new construction homes are stalled due to Hurricane Sandy, but the weather shouldn’t have a lasting effect on the homebuilding business, leaders in the construction industry told the Wall Street Journal today.

“It’s logistically a bit of a challenge to settle homes right now,” Martin Connor, chief financial officer of Toll Brothers, the nation’s largest homebuilder, told the Journal. “The homes are done, but you’re dependent on the mortgage company, the insurance company, the bank, the title company to be up and running to put the sale to bed,” he said. “And a lot of people aren’t able to do that, especially insurance companies, who aren’t anxious to write new policies right now. [more]