Trevor Bond, CEO of W.P. Carey

New York-based investment management firm W.P. Carey & Co. is set to change its official status to a real estate investment trust, it announced today, and will acquire Corporate Property Associates 15, a non-traded REIT that it manages.

Following the acquisition, W. P. Carey is expected to have a total equity market capitalization of approximately $3 billion, total market capitalization of $5 billion and a portfolio of 43 million square feet of corporate real estate completely leased to 135 companies around the world, according to a statement from the company. [more]

From left: James Dimon, whose firm JPMorgan Chase owes $300,000; Crowne Plaza JFK, which owes $944,491; the Holiday Inn JFK, which owes $852,239; Gordon DuGan, whose firm W. P. Carey & Co. owes $464,000 (Dimon photo source: Public Intelligence)

Tax debtors beware: New York State is calling you out.

Last Friday, the New York State Department of Taxation and Finance went live on its Web site with lists of the top 250 individual and corporate tax debtors in the state.

The individual debtors range from Onandaga County resident Bradley Cooke, who owes $381,509, to Irving Bilzinsky, the former Scores strip clubs owner from Brooklyn who topped out the list with more than $15 million outstanding taxes from between 2007 and 2009. Among businesses, Gui Hong Chen, of Queens, took the top spot with more than $19 million in unpaid corporate taxes.

This week, The Real Deal combed through the newly-public documents to find the worst offenders in New York City real estate.

They include luxury broker Agnes Nolan and her late husband, who owe more than $850,000 in personal income taxes, a subsidiary of real estate investment firm W.P. Carey, which has a warrant out for roughly $464,000, and JPMorgan Chase Bank, which owes upwards of $300,000 (see the full list after the jump).

Perhaps the highest-profile individuals listed were Ponzi-schemer Bernard Madoff (No. 69, with $984,281 in sales taxes) and celebrity fashion photographer Annie Leibovitz (No. 83, with $503,740 in personal income taxes outstanding). Earlier this week, Leibovitz narrowly avoided emergency sales of her four New York homes — three Greenwich Village brownstones and part of the Astor family’s estate in Rhinebeck, N.Y. — when a Los Angeles private equity firm specializing in distressed real estate agreed to take on her millions of dollars in debt. [more]

While many of the money center banks are sitting on the sidelines when it comes to providing mortgage financing, Chinese, German and European financial institutions and insurance companies are dipping their feet into the water to provide much needed financing for commercial real estate. Foreign and domestic lenders and insurance companies prefer to lend to real estate investment trusts. Later this month, a syndicate led by Westdeutsche ImmobilienBank is expected to close on a $135 million loan on the 25-story office tower at 300 Park Avenue. The 15 floors of the tower serve as the world headquarters for Colgate Palmolive. The borrowing entity is controlled by Tishman Speyer Properties. As reported in The Real Deal today, a syndicate of banks led by the Bank of China, provided SL Green Realty with a five-year, floating rate mortgage for $475 million for the landmark Times Square office tower at 1515 Broadway. The new mortgage replaces the former $625 million mortgage that was due to mature in November 2010.  More
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