From left: Mayor Bloomberg (credit: Edward Reed), Jeffrey Winick, CEO of Winick Realty Group, David Firestein, president of retail brokerage Northwest Atlantic, Benjamin Fox, executive vice president of Massey Knakal Realty Services, and David Zar, a managing member of Midtown-based Zar Property NY

[Updated 3:01 p.m., Dec. 6, 2011 with breakdown of Massey Knakal listings] Mayor Michael Bloomberg highlighted the impact of tourism and government on New York City’s retail marketplace, during his speech to attendees of the country’s second largest retail convention held in Midtown, and hosted by the International Council of Shopping Centers.

He said the city is the nation’s top tourist destination, expected to draw a record more than 50 million visitors this year. Foreign visitors’ overall spending has surged, he noted, with each visitor spending an average of $1,700 each on a trip to the Big Apple.

“Retail spending by international visitors [In New York City] was 37 percent higher during the third quarter [of] this year compared with the same period in 2010,” he said. [more]

From the November issue: New York is, of course, the shopping (and eating) capital of the country — if not the world. But what do the latest concerns about a double-dip recession mean for the countless stores, restaurants and shops packed into Manhattan?

In this month’s Q & A, The Real Deal talked to Manhattan retail brokers about how the retail market — which tanked in the wake of the 2008 financial meltdown — is holding up.

Brokers said they are seeing strong rents and activity in prime areas like Fifth Avenue, Time Square, Soho and the Upper West Side. But, they say, secondary and tertiary submarkets are hurting, with continuing declines in asking rents and increases in vacancy rates. [more]

From the October issue: In 21st-century New York, watching a movie no longer requires leaving the apartment. Thanks to the likes of Netflix and On Demand, a seemingly inexhaustible supply of films and TV shows now appears at the touch of a button.

But what about those who want to pick out a movie at an actual video store? These days, that’s becoming more and more difficult. The number of video rental shops fell 17 percent in the city from 885 in 2002 to 731 in 2007, according to the most recent U.S. Census data.

Movie rental giant Blockbuster filed for Chapter 11 in 2010. And, many mom-and-pop video rental stores have closed, too, as a result of online competition, following in the footsteps of other contracting industries like bookstores (see Borders) and music shops (see Tower Records) that have also shuttered in the last few years. [more]

The state agency responsible for regulating real estate licenses has sanctioned nearly 170
New York City residential and commercial real estate brokers and agents in recent years,
including professionals at high-profile firms such as the Corcoran Group, Prudential
Douglas Elliman, RFR Realty and Winick Realty Group.

More than 200 brokers and salespersons based in New York City were identified
as having committed violations ranging from unintentionally retaining an unearned
commission to operating without a broker’s license, according to nearly 100 consent
orders, mostly filed by the state between 2009 and March 2011.

The Real Deal obtained the consent orders through a Freedom of Information
Law request made earlier this year. The publication reviewed the 905
pages of documents detailing nearly 180 consent orders statewide and
created a searchable spreadsheet for the 95 New York City cases (see
document here or
after the jump), along with links to the original DOS documents (after the jump) [more]

In his first video interview since being hired away last week from Winick Realty Group, veteran retail broker Benjamin Fox, executive vice president at Massey Knakal Realty Services, says discount giant Wal-Mart Stores might look for locations in Herald Square, near Bloomingdales in Midtown, or in Queens, among other places. Fox was speculating, and is not working with Wal-Mart in the search. In addition, Fox and Robert Knakal, chairman of Massey Knakal, told Insights from The Real Deal that property values often rise after a major chain retailer moves in.

But any opening is far off, Fox said, citing a high-level, internal Wal-Mart memo he had seen. “Everyone is getting way ahead of themselves,” he said. The Bentonville, Ark., global chain began a publicity push this month in New York City, as it tries to open its first store, after abandoning efforts twice before due to community opposition.
[more]

From left: Zelnik and Winick

The prosecution is scheduled to deliver its final statement this morning in the federal securities fraud case against two former Duane Reade executives who are accused of using bogus real estate deals throu [more]

Jeff Winick

From the May issue: Drugstore chain Duane Reade had a problem: A competitor was sniffing around a large space across the street from one of its best Midtown locations on Sixth Avenue near West 57th Street. Officials at the store enlisted its broker, Winick Realty Group, to take care of the situation.

Several months later, not only had the competitor disappeared, but Duane Reade had taken that site at 100 West 57th Street for itself.

That’s partly thanks to Winick Realty’s founder and CEO, Jeff Winick, who used back channels to help secure the site for the drugstore. Winick’s aggressive, take-no-prisoners style seems to win him accolades from clients but has created fierce enmity among his competition.

That style has been on full display for the last few weeks in a federal courtroom in Lower Manhattan, where two former Duane Reade executives are on trial for fraudulently pumping up earnings reports, partly through allegedly bogus real estate transactions involving Winick. [more]

Gerald Brauser testified about a deal at commercial space in 62 West 62nd Street (Building photo source: PropertyShark)

One of Manhattan’s major parking garage owners, Gerald Brauser, took the stand last week as a government witness in the ongoing federal trial of two former Duane Reade executives accused of using bogus real estate deals to pump up earnings.
Brauser told the court that he was an unwitting participant in three transactions in Manhattan and New Jersey that prosecutors said were used to fraudulently boost the earnings of the drugstore chain, a review of court transcripts from April 26 shows. He also told the jury that he had a long relationship with Winick Realty Group CEO Jeff Winick, and had lent him more than $1 million over the years.
Brauser, who leads the Brauser Group, is the second major real estate investor to testify at the trial. Jeff Sutton, of Wharton Properties, testified April 20. Brauser and Sutton are not accused of any wrongdoing and prosecutors said there were landlords who were not complicit in the schemes. [more]

The ongoing federal trial of two former Duane Reade executives on
charges that they misled investors through bogus real estate
transactions may sully the reputation of one of the city’s leading
retail brokerage firms even though it faces no charges, real estate insiders say. Winick Realty, its CEO Jeff Winick and former president
Cory Zelnik have not been charged in the case but some of their
business deals are under scrutiny. “Once an allegation is made and
it goes through the media sound chamber, people who were only partially
paying attention will have it stick in their cranium,” said real estate
attorney Lawrence Lenzner, partner at Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler,
who is not involved in the trial. “Even if it is 100 percent false,
enough people have heard it, his name has been disparaged and it can
take years to recover from that.” [more]

The defense in the federal trial of two former Duane Reade executives is painting a murky picture of two of the city’s leading retail brokers as the trial entered its second week. The brokers, who are not charged in the case, acted on a few deals with
Duane Reade as both landlord and broker. In addition, the trial has
painted a picture of a retail leasing environment in which landlords in a
few instances paid brokers in cash to avoid taxes, including one
instance of a suitcase filled with cash, though such cash dealings
didn’t occur in connection with the Duane Reade deals. Defense attorney Reid Weingarten, representing one of the two Duane
Reade executives accused of orchestrating sham real estate deals with
affiliates of Winick Realty Group, said that while the deals were not
bogus arrangements, they were pieces in a cloudy interconnected world
where payments flew back and forth between limited liability companies.
[more]