After 50 years in the same spot inside the Seybold Building, the premier gemstone retail center in downtown Miami, jeweler Howard Steinlauf was ready to venture into a new space.
Yair Levy, a developer banned for life from selling condos and co-ops in New York, was also looking for a fresh start.
In 2018, he and his partners paid $14.5 million for Metro Mall at 1 Northeast 1st Street, his first project in South Florida. Two years later, Levy — founder of Time Century Holdings — began a $50 million renovation to convert the vacant office and retail building across the street from the Seybold into what he hoped would be the jewelry center’s prime competitor.
He rechristened Metro Mall as the Time Century Jewelry Center in a nod to his New York-based firm and offered to make Steinlauf’s business, Freddy’s Certified Diamonds & Fine Jewelry, Time Century’s showcase tenant.
“We felt it was a good opportunity,” Steinlauf said. “I wanted to make a statement with a beautiful new store.”
Three years later, the Time Century Jewelry Center is an abandoned construction site.
Steinlauf regrets signing a lease with Levy and claims the developer had assured him Freddy’s new home would be move-in ready by June 2022. Freddy’s is suing the developer and his partners for breach of contract, fraud and unjust enrichment, seeking about $1.2 million in damages.
“I have been paying double the rent for 18 months with absolutely no new building to go into,” Steinlauf said. “Yair Levy misled us the entire time.”
Steinlauf’s falling-out with his new landlord is just one in a series of catastrophic events jeopardizing Levy’s effort to launch the Time Century Jewelry Center and revive his disgraced development career.
In addition to dealing with lawsuits from Steinlauf and another tenant, Levy and his partners have run out of money to finish the project. Time Century is not the only Miami commercial project to encounter long delays, especially in the current climate of high interest rates. But its failure to proceed as planned is a black spot on Levy’s planned comeback.
Making matters worse, a lender recently won a partial judgment to foreclose on the building. Without a new investor to infuse more capital, the Time Century Jewelry Center may never open.
Levy declined multiple interview requests for this story. His son-in-law and Time Century Holdings’ co-managing director, Dan Deutsch, addressed some of the troubles. Deutsch declined to comment on Steinlauf’s allegations, but he confirmed that the renovation project has stalled due to a lack of funds.
“We are right there,” Deutsch said. “It is so frustrating to us. We thought we hit a grand slam and worked hard to get this building ready.”
Levy seeks redemption in Miami
In 2011, Levy came to the end of his road in New York.
A judge found that he had defrauded the Rector Square condominium in Battery Park City by failing to deposit millions of dollars in the building’s reserve fund and spending some of the money on personal expenses, including his mobile phone accounts. Then-Attorney General Eric Schneiderman banned the developer from selling real estate in the Empire State.
Levy appealed the decision but lost. He maintains that reserve funds were used for legitimate purposes and that personal expenses were drawn from separate accounts.
“People think I have a bad name, and that’s why I am trying to explain this story,” Levy said in a 2014 interview with Crain’s New York Business. “[People are] mistaken as far as what happened in the past.”
And so when he and his partners purchased Metro Mall, a nine-story, 225,000-square-foot building completed in 1926, Levy was not just making an investment — he was also seeking a place where he could reshape his career. The site is in downtown Miami’s four-block jewelry district, which is home to more than 500 jewelers who create, buy, sell and make repairs.
“I have been paying double the rent for 18 months with absolutely no new building to go into. Yair Levy misled us the entire time.”
In 2020, Levy moved forward with the renovation of the property. He gutted the interiors and enlisted Miami-based architect Kobi Karp, a specialist in historic restoration projects, to bring the building “back to its glory days,” the developer told The Real Deal at the time.
The new plans showed spaces for jewelry wholesalers, stores, artisans and repair services in the building’s first four stories, with glass storefronts opening onto a three-story atrium. The upper four floors would remain as office space. Levy added valet parking to the new entrance.
When renovations began, Levy said he had pre-leased 40 percent of the building. Steinlauf was among those who signed on. He was impressed with the plans for the building and where Freddy’s would be situated, and he liked that Levy had hired Karp as the designer, Steinlauf said.
“Yair was obviously convincing enough,” Steinlauf said. “I analyzed the future of being their featured tenant. At the time, it looked good.”
Levy reeled in Big Apple gemstone purveyors like Vlad Yunatanov, owner of the high-end Manhattan jeweler Alexander Sparks, which also sells online. Yunatanov took a corner suite on the ground floor of the planned Time Century Jewelry Center, signing a five-year lease.
“What really keeps me wanting to be there is that it is going to be a brand-new mall,” Yunatanov said. “There are also a lot of manufacturers that are going to be there. So if we need to resize a ring or do repairs, there are a lot of people who can do that stuff.”
New York Times to hard times
In January 2023, Levy’s tattered reputation got a boost from an effusive story in the New York Times about the Time Century Jewelry Center.
The report noted that Levy and his partners had signed more than 60 leases with asking rents at about $150 per square foot for prime spaces. David Primak, chief operating officer of New York-based diamond retailer Sasha Primak, told the newspaper that Levy’s project “feels like a natural fit for us.”
But Primak told TRD in a recent phone call that he ultimately decided not to lease space in the building.
“I had a lot of reasons for why we didn’t sign the lease,” Primak said. “I don’t really want to get into it.”
As the Times tribute hit newsstands, Levy’s project was already in trouble.
Three contractors filed liens against the property between December 2022 and January 2023 for a total of $133,400 in allegedly unpaid work.
Levy and his partners settled those debts in March, but eight more construction liens for a combined $724,200 were filed between April and August of 2023. Of that amount, Levy and his partners have paid $60,500, court records show.
In September, the project faced an even bigger setback. City National Bank of Florida filed a foreclosure lawsuit against Levy’s development entity for allegedly defaulting on a $27.2 million construction loan obtained in 2021. The loan was originally for $23.6 million, but the bank had given Levy’s partnership an additional $3.6 million in 2022.
The development entity allegedly failed to pay back the loan despite receiving a forbearance that expired in June. It also failed to obtain a certificate of occupancy and did not replenish its interest reserve accounts, the lawsuit states. On Dec. 12, Gina Beovides, a Miami-Dade circuit court judge, awarded City National a partial judgment of $31.2 million that included additional fees and interest.
Deutsch, the co-managing director and son-in-law, acknowledged that the project faced delays and cost overruns, but insisted that the jewelry center is nearly complete. A recent tour of the building confirmed that most of the work has been done, but construction was at a standstill. Sawdust caked the new Spanish tile flooring, and pallets of construction materials were scattered throughout the first, second and third floors. A massive chandelier hung from the ceiling of the atrium, still covered in plastic.
“The building looks beautiful,” Deutsch said. “It is just about ready to go. It’s just a matter of getting some additional funds to complete it.”
Time Century is still trying to work things out with City National, Deutsch said. A spokesperson for the bank declined to comment.
“There is still communication between us and them,” Deutsch said. “We are hoping we are able to come out of this on good terms, even though it is in foreclosure.”
Lawsuits mount
About a week after City National filed its lawsuit, Freddy’s sued Levy, his daughter Galit Levy and two Time Century affiliates, including the development entity. The jewelry store claims it paid Time Century $815,937 for the security deposit and build-out expenses, as well as $790,000 in holdover rent to its current landlord.
Freddy’s lease at Seybold expired in June 2022, when the store was supposed to move into Levy’s building, the lawsuit says. The complaint also alleges that Levy never disclosed his legal troubles or ban in New York ban when he was wooing Steinlauf.
In September, Levy held a meeting with Steinlauf and other signed tenants to inform them that his partnership had run out of money to finish the project and needed a new investor, Freddy’s lawsuit alleges.
Another tenant, New York-based luxury handbag retailer Privé Porter, sued Levy and the Time Century affiliates in October, making similar allegations.
Privé Porter President Jeffrey Berk and his lawyer declined comment.
During the tenant meeting, Steinlauf said, Levy claimed that he had a new investor lined up and that the building would be up and running in two weeks. “That was three months ago,” Steinlauf said. “They gave no explanation about how they ran out of money.”
Deutsch said he couldn’t comment on the allegations and noted that he was not present for conversations Steinlauf had with Levy. He insisted that Time Century is very close to landing a new partner, but he declined to disclose the investor’s identity or contribution.
“We’ve tried to communicate to the tenants, reassuring them we are pretty close to finishing up the building,” Deutsch said. “They may even stay.”
Alexander Sparks’ Yunatanov is one of those staying. “I am nervous,” he said. “I can afford to wait it out.”
Even if Levy and his partners get their act together, Steinlauf doesn’t want to move into the Time Century Jewelry Center anymore. He hopes to stay at Seybold, he said.
He just doesn’t trust Levy.
“I am old-school and learned to do things on a handshake,” he said. “We have been totally defrauded from day one.”