As the fate of the Trump Organization hangs in the balance, so too does the ownership of some of New York’s most prominent properties.
New York Attorney General Letitia James sought to have the company’s business certificates when she filed her civil lawsuit against former President Donald Trump and his real estate business last year. A judge’s ruling this week found Trump fraudulently inflated values of his properties, enabling the potential loss of such properties to happen, according to the New York Times.
Penalties against the Trump business and clan are expected to be decided in a trial slated to begin as early as Monday. Trump’s team is still playing its cards, requesting more information on the ruling’s impact and weighing a stay on the decision about a receivership for the properties.
These are the vulnerable properties that could be in danger of slipping from the Trump empire.
Trump Tower
Both the property and the former president’s penthouse apartment at 721–725 Fifth Avenue are at risk. James alleged Trump deceptively came to the highest possible value for the building, at one point using a nearby sales comparison to boost the value of Trump Tower by $170 million over a single year.
As for Trump’s personal triplex, financial statements from the Trump Organization showed the pad’s value increased by 400 percent from 2011 to 2015, reaching $327 million in the latter; James alleged Trump overstated gross square by nearly triple.
40 Wall Street
The Trump Organization is under scrutiny for a 2015 valuation of 40 Wall Street, which came in nearly $200 million above that made by a lender-ordered appraiser. Among the issues James cited in her suit was the use of a valuable Dean & Deluca lease not yet signed and an understatement of expenses like management fees. Fitch recently downgraded a security attached to the property.
4-6 East 57th Street
Trump and his organization’s entities valued the interest of the leased property at $445 million in 2019. Trump allegedly inflated the value by at least $37 million by using elevated forward-looking income figures and diminished backward-looking expense figures. The retail picture at the property has seesawed back and forth in recent years.
Trump Park Avenue
Trump is accused of inflating the value of the building at 502 Park Avenue by valuing a dozen rent-stabilized apartments as market-rate. James’ suit said the appraised value of those apartments was $750,000, versus the $50 million valuation given by Trump. The then-GOP presidential candidate sold a sponsor condo unit there in 2016 for $14 million.
1290 Sixth Avenue
Trump only has a minority stake in the 43-story Midtown building, but he and his entities are accused of calculated his 30 percent stake — minus debt — as an asset that can be freely sold, which isn’t the case due to the rules governing the partnership that owns the property. He is also accused of inflating the building’s worth by using a false capitalization rate. Vornado Realty Trust is the co-owner of the 2.1 million-square-foot office tower.
Seven Springs
The bucolic Westchester estate was one of the Trump properties targeted in a criminal probe of the Trump Organization. A subsidiary of the company purchased the property in 1995. When Eric Trump put his sights on building two dozen luxury lots there in 2014, an appraiser the company hired valued the lots at $30 million. Yet the company reported a value of $23 million per lot, just accounting for the plots in one town of the sprawling estate.
Trump National Golf Club Hudson Valley
The Trump Organization is inflated membership prices at the Hopewell Junction golf club to inflate the property’s value, too. While the listed initiation fee a decade ago was $10,000, Trump regularly valued unsold memberships between $15,000 and $30,000, according to the lawsuit.
Trump National Golf Club Westchester
Membership fees were again cited as an issue at a Trump golf course, this one in Briarcliff Manor. Trump’s valuation of the course in 2011 assumed 67 incoming members would pay $200,000 each in entry fees; most ultimately paid nothing, according to the lawsuit.
— Holden Walter-Warner
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