Union Bank, a wholly-owned subsidiary of The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, has reached an agreement with Deutsche Bank to acquire PB Capital Corporation’s institutional commercial real estate lending portfolio and platform. It will pay a 3 percent premium above the over $3.7 billion face amount of PB’s commercial mortgage portfolio, sources told The Mortgage Observer.
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When on the road, Jeffery Hayward often carries a personally customized guide, with the addresses of all the multifamily buildings that Fannie Mae has financed in the area. Then the head of the government-sponsored enterprise’s Multifamily Mortgage Business drives from building to building.
“I want to see what we are financing,” Mr. Hayward told The Mortgage Observer recently, during a series of meetings in his Washington, D.C. office. “I have actually walked a lot of the properties that we financed—I know what they look like, I have seen the tenants.” Read More
Morgan Stanley has provided a $275 million loan to finance the acquisition of the Milford Plaza Hotel, sources told The Mortgage Observer. The 10-year loan has an interest rate under 3.5 percent, according to sources familiar with the deal, and will be securitized.
The Mortgage Observer caught up with outgoing PMCC President David Twardock at last month’s Mortgage Bankers Association in San Diego. We covered the up-and-down nature of the business as well as his post-PMCC plans.
The Mortgage Observer: You’re retiring this month after over 30 years with Prudential. Have you spent your entire career there?
David Read More
Commercial and multifamily mortgage originations hit their highest levels since 2007 in the fourth quarter 2012, and are expected to increase up to $254 billion in 2013, according to research by the Mortgage Bankers Association released on Monday at its annual CREF/Multifamily Housing Convention & Expo in San Diego. In the fourth quarter 2012 originations were up 49 percent from the quarter previous. They were also up 49 percent from the same quarter in 2011. Overall, originations for the full year of 2012 increased 24 percent compared to 2011. Read More
With $429.1 billion in U.S. master and primary servicing as of December 31, 2012, Wells Fargo remains at the top of the commercial and multifamily mortgage servicers ranking released by the Mortgage Bankers Association at the MBA’s CREF/Multifamily Housing Convention & Expo in San Diego. Read More
As the final hours and minutes of 2012 ticked down, a number of the leading bankers who provide real estate financing were taking stock of 2012’s results. A majority of those reached for comment conceded that they had reached or exceeded their expectations. Nevertheless, they said, with the year coming to a close, they must once again prepare to start from zero to reach new goals. Read More
To cap off 2012, The Mortgage Observer spoke to M&T Bank’s Peter D’Arcy, a 17-year company veteran who was recently promoted to regional president for New York City. Mr. D’Arcy spoke about his years with the bank, his new role and M&T’s plans to build its middle-market and health care lending presence. Read More
Last fall, a group of lenders—including debt funds, insurance companies and international banks—competed for the $80 million assignment to refinance Lehman Brothers Holdings’ On The Ave Hotel on New York City’s Upper West Side.
Ultimately, the borrower tapped Singapore-based United Overseas Bank, which in the last two years has been behind several large office loans in New York and hotel loans on the West Coast, but which was essentially a newcomer to the city’s hotel lending scene. UOB inked the deal during the same late November week when Bank of China closed a $465.9 million loan on the iconic Plaza Hotel, after having refinanced the Mandarin Oriental Hotel for $170 million earlier in 2012. Read More
Gawker has a new landlord. The home of the blog, which professes that “Today’s gossip is tomorrow’s news,” has been sold as part of a portfolio of four buildings on Elizabeth Street, in Nolita, The Commercial Observer has learned. Read More
Stillman Development International–a development firm renowned for its condo developments with “starchitects” such as I.M. Pei, Michael Graves and Philip Johnson–and Morris Adjmi Architects are planning the conversion of a 19th-century industrial building in Noho into luxury condos, The Commercial Observer has learned. Read More
Giorgio Armani is getting a view over the High Line. The Italian fashion company has inked a lease for a 60,000-square-foot space at 450 West 15th Street in the Meatpacking District, sources familiar with the transaction confirmed to The Commercial Observer, and is due to move its headquarters and showroom to the space in October 2013. Read More
Codecademy, an online educational platform that offers free coding classes and counts Mayor Michael Bloomberg among its subscribers, is opening its first office on the entire fourth floor of 49 West 27th Street, between Avenue of the Americas and Broadway. The company inked a five-year lease for 8,700 square feet in the building at a rent in the high $30s per square foot. Read More
NuvoTV, the first English-language cable network geared toward bi-cultural Latinos in the United States, is moving its New York office to the fifth floor of 501 Seventh Avenue.
The company has inked a four-year lease on a 5,449-square-foot, pre-built suite with landlord W&H Properties. Asking rent was $48 per square foot. Read More
LinkedIn, the social network for work professionals that boasts more than 187 million members across 200 countries, is expanding its New York office space in the iconic Empire State Building. The company has inked a 10-years lease for 40,781 square feet of space on the 23rd floor of the building, where it is reaching a total occupancy of 72,523 square feet. The asking rent for the new space was $51 per square foot. Read More
