From left: Stuart Saft and the W Downtown Hotel

A U.S. District Court judge ruled against Joseph Moinian’s Moinian Group in a closely watched escrow dispute with buyers at the W New York Downtown Hotel and Residences, a decision that lawyers say further establishes the applicability of the Interstate Land Sales Full Disclosure Act in New York condominium sales.

Judge Robert Patterson rejected a motion to dismiss the case by the Moinian Group, which developed the 217-unit hotel and condo at 123 Washington Street, and argued that the federal ILSA law does not apply to condos, but was designed to protect consumers against fraudulent land sales. [more]

The Moinian Group, developer of the W New York Downtown Hotel at 123 Washington Street, told Community Board 1 that it has no explanation for the string of work-stoppages that have hit the $240 million project. The city has stopped construction at the 58-story project eight times
since the beginning of the year. The most recent stop-work order,
lifted earlier this month, was issued
after a piece of wood fell from a crane bucket onto a parked pick-up
truck. In April, Oskar Brecher, a vice president of the Moinian Group,
agreed to give a monthly report on the project to Community Board 1′s
Financial District Committee. Brecher said that safety measures at the
site have been strengthened. [more]