Empire State Building IPO faces new challenge, John Catsimatidis readies another downtown Brooklyn tower … and more

1. A new challenge for the Empire State Building IPO: small-stake inheritor and his team of investors trying to block or alter the deal [WSJ]
2. Jared Kushner’s Kushner Cos. set to take 25 percent stake in Maryland rental portfolio valued at $500M[WSJ]
3. FHA refis almost tripled in June [Housingwire]
4. 73,000-sf vacant Rockaways beachfront property hits market for whopping $5.9M[Times Ledger]
5. Following delay due to revolution, Cinnabon opens up in Libya [NYDN]
6. Group of distressed Connecticut homeowners benefit from $25B bank settlement [NYT]
7. Roosevelt Island’s FDR Four Freedoms Park approaches completion 40 years after it was originally designed [Untapped New York]
8. New sewer maps in New Jersey pave battlefield over developing environmentally sensitive land [NYT]
9. John Catsimatidis getting ready to build his second of four Downtown Brooklyn buildings [Brownstoner]
10. East End Dunes Residents Association in Hamptons pitches idea for beachfront nature preserve in hopes of turning same Napeague plot into public beach [Curbed]
11. East Village Gulf station now a BP [EV Grieve]
12. Op-Ed: turns out we were lucky to lose the 2012 Olympics bid [Crain’s]
13. Bushwick bookstore owner looks to serve up alcohol inside his store to enhance business [NYDN]
14. According to Yelp, Liam of JMKBK tops the list of Park Slope’s best brokers and agents [FIPS]
15. Detroit vacation rental asking $40 seems okay, but it’s not a house — it’s a van from the early ’90s [Curbed]