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Tishman Speyer pays out $25M to Hudson Yards holdouts
"Most feared tenant attorney" David Rozenholc strikes again
A pair of dogged, enterprising tenants – or system-exploiting jerks, depending on your point of view – won a massive settlement from Tishman Speyer for finally vacating their West Side pad.
Gary Schwedock and Steven Kobrick, who lived at 10th Avenue and West 35th Street in the heart of the emerging Hudson Yards project, received $25 million from the developer after refusing to vacate and deploying veteran tenant lawyer David Rozenholc.
To win the settlement, Rozenholic employed grinding delay tactics. Tishman, he said, was right to concede.
“I would have taken the next step and come up with another argument. [Even] if [the developer] wins every step of the way, it will take them five years,” he told Crain’s.
Rozenholic, indeed, has a reputation for this sort of thing.
“He’s the most feared tenant attorney with respect to development sites,” said Magnum Real Estate Group’s Ben Shaoul. “I don’t think he has ever lost a case.”
Tishman bought the surrounding area in two separate deals for $438 million in April 2014, with plans to build a 61-story office tower at a cost of $3.2 billion. [Crain’s] – Ariel Stulberg