By Gus Delaporte 5/22 10:00am

ICSC 2013

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NYC Retail Heat Map

New York retail comes in sizes large and small, from spaces of only a few hundred feet in Soho
to the city’s massive department stores. As developers continue to find new parcels of land to build upon, new opportunities for retail take shape.

Downtown continues to be repositioned as a retail destination with Brookfield Place, One World Trade Center and the redeveloped South Street Seaport expected to house hundreds of thousands of square feet of shopping space. Not to be outdone, Herald Square is looking at a repositioning, aimed not at discount stores but full-priced international retailers.

After the jump, The Commercial Observer pinpoints 10 retail trends impacting New York City. Read More

By Al Barbarino 5/21 9:00am

ICSC 2013

(Credit: LeVar Thomas)

Retail on the Rebound: Spirits High at ICSC Event

In 2009 and 2010 “you could have rolled a bowling ball down the aisle” at the International Council of Shopping Centers’ RECon conference “and it wouldn’t have hit anybody,” Massey Knakal executive vice president of retail leasing Benjamin Fox told The Commercial Observer.

But when an estimated 33,000 real estate professionals converged upon one million Read More

By Gus Delaporte 5/02 9:00am

Postings

CO POSTINGS 4-30

Power 100 Heat Map

From a Taconic Investment Partners project in Hunts Point to the World Trade Center site in Lower Manhattan, power in New York real estate circles has increasingly expanded from the comfortable confines of Midtown Manhattan to the fringes of all five boroughs. While large developments such as the Related Company’s Hudson Yards often dominate the conversation, Brooklyn, Queens and even the Bronx continue to grow in stature.

Long Island City is fast becoming a focal point for the real estate industry as Rockrose and other residential developers tap into the growing Queens neighborhood. In the Bronx, Taconic Investment Partners, formerly the owners of 111 Eighth Avenue, is in the process of a significant capital improvement plan at the BankNote Building on Lafayette Avenue in Hunt’s Point.

Below, a sampling of where power thrives in New York City in 2013. Read More

By Richard Persichetti 5/01 5:00pm

Stat of the Week

Power5

The Power 5: The City’s Top 5 Markets

In honor of this week’s Power 100 rankings of real estate professionals, I figured I would create the first annual Power 5 rankings of the top submarkets by year-to-date leasing activity. To make things even across all 17 submarkets, they are based on leases signed and renewed as a percentage of the submarket’s total inventory. So without further ado, here are the Power 5.

Read More

By Al Barbarino 4/11 4:23pm

Lease Beat

Hudson3_ss

SAP Inks 115,000 SF Lease at Hudson Yards

SAP has inked a lease for 115,000 square feet of space at the South Tower of Hudson Yards, the developers of the 15-million-square-foot project on the far west side of Manhattan announced yesterday.

The announcement came along with news that L’Oréal leased 402,000 square feet for their U.S. corporate headquarters at the building, bringing the LEED Gold South Tower to more than 80 percent occupancy. Sources said the deals are for 15 years.

The companies join Coach, which agreed to pay a reported $750 million for its 740,000-square-foot global corporate headquarters in the tower in late 2011, after what Related’s president on the project, Jay Cross, called a three-year negation process.

“We are thrilled that global beauty and software powerhouses L’Oréal and SAP, along with Coach, Inc., will be locating at Hudson Yards,” said Stephen Ross, Related Companies’ Chairman, in a prepared statement.  “With construction already underway, we look forward to continuing to implement our ambitious vision for the defining development of the 21st Century and the new heart of New York.” Read More

By Al Barbarino 4/11 4:09pm

Lease Beat

(Credit: VISUALHOUSE)

L’Oréal USA Inks 402,000 SF Lease at Hudson Yards

L’Oréal USA has inked a 402,000-square-foot of space at the South Tower of Hudson Yards, the developers of the 15-million-square-foot project on the far west side of Manhattan announced yesterday.

Along with that announcement came news that SAP also leased 115,000 square feet on the top four floors of the building, bringing the LEED Gold South Tower to more than 80 percent occupancy.  Sources said the deals are for 15 years.

The companies join Coach, which agreed to pay a reported $750 million for its 740,000-square-foot global corporate headquarters in the tower in late 2011, after what Related’s president on the project, Jay Cross, called a three-year negotiation process.

“The confluence of three significant tenants committing to the building almost simultaneously is a testimonial to the belief in this project and its future,” said CBRE’s Stephen Siegel, who represented L’Oréal with Mike Geoghegan, Bill Hedman and Lauren Crowley Corrinet. Read More

By Al Barbarino 4/10 8:00am

New Developments

51 ASTOR

Waiting on a Dream: Betting on ‘Spec’ at 51 Astor Place

The dark glass walls lining 51 Astor Place are modernistic, if not futuristic. Some critics have claimed that its developer’s asking rents, at upward of $115 a foot, are from the future too.

Others have argued that Edward Minskoff took a gamble in erecting the structure without an anchor tenant—a so-called “spec tower.”

But for Mr. Minskoff, who has developed close to 37 million square feet of property in 10 cities around the country—maintaining patience as a virtue—the term takes on a positive connotation.

“A spec tower means that we started the development with the confidence that if you build it they will come, and with the confidence necessary to lease the building,” Mr. Minskoff told The Commercial Observer.  “If you’re going to plan a building and you don’t start it until a tenant comes walking along, you can be sitting on the dirt for 10 years.” Read More

By Billy Gray 3/27 2:21pm

Tantrums

Christine Quinn

Christine Quinn Decries “Sick, Sexist” Hudson Yards Critic in 2002 Phone Messages

As a page one New York Times story about Christine Quinn‘s short temper made the rounds yesterday, a recording of the mayoral candidate’s feisty voice mails from 2002 was uploaded to YouTube.

Ms. Quinn left the messages for a Hell’s Kitchen resident who opposed area developments including Hudson Yards (now under construction) and the West Side Stadium (long since jettisoned). The recipient spread his criticism to Ms. Quinn, who as district three representative did not personally attend a December 17, 2002 press conference condemning the projects. Read More

By Al Barbarino 3/13 8:00am

Development

wagon

Midtown’s Westward Expansion Offers a Modern Crack at Manifest Destiny

Like the westward expansion that gripped the nation during the early to mid-1800′s, the expansion of Midtown Manhattan offers the city’s commercial real estate pioneers a modern crack at manifest destiny.

The trajectory of Midtown’s new building stock over the last seven decades tells a story of westward expansion that most recently struck Midtown West with the Hudson Yards development project.

“Hudson Yards really is the last frontier,” said James Delmonte, principal and vice president of research at Avison Young.  “Firms are looking for newer product and larger floor plates, largely because there really is no available land on the east side.” Read More

By Billy Gray 2/20 8:00am

The Sit-Down

Matt Van Buren

CBRE Tristate President Matt Van Buren on the Megadeal’s Comeback and the Post-Sandy Summer

It will be two years ago this summer that Matt Van Buren succeeded Mitch Rudin as CBRE’s tristate president. The Commercial Observer spoke with Mr. Van Buren about the state of the region—and of the Yankees—as the area prepares to emerge from its long, cold winter of discontent.

Since taking over as CBRE’s tristate president, what has been your biggest accomplishment and biggest setback?

I took over for a tristate region office that was in really good condition following Mitch Rudin’s presidency. The biggest accomplishment has been keeping that momentum going forward. When you’re number one, the goal is to stay number one. And we’ve been able to do that. Staying number one is one of the great unsung stories of the world. That’s why I respect the 2000 Yankees so much. [Laughs]

You run CBRE’s offices in Midtown, Downtown, Long Island, Westchester, New Jersey and Connecticut. Do the fortunes of the different metro area hubs often diverge or does a rising tide lift all boats?

To a certain degree it does. Although the highs are higher and the lows are lower in Manhattan. If you look at rents and availability statistics, Connecticut, Westchester, New Jersey and Long Island vary in a fairly narrow range even from boom to bust.

Frankly, New York will always have lower availability. But the prices will fluctuate high and low if you took a percentage off of a norm. Read More

By Al Barbarino 1/31 8:00am

Controversies

A peak atop the Armani Exchange at City Point

Gary LaBarbara of Building Trades Thrashes City Point Developers as Community Groups Rally for Changes

Gary LaBarbara has an axe to grind with developers at City Point before they dig any deeper into Downtown Brooklyn.

In a move that could exacerbate friction that’s already occurring at the community level, the president of the Building & Construction Trades Council of New York thrashed the builders of the development project, claiming that they are “failing” to meet the needs of the community by instead catering to private interests.

“City Point is receiving vast amounts of public subsidies ranging from tax exempt bond financing to property tax abatements,” Mr. LaBarbera wrote in an op-ed that appeared in Real Estate Weekly yesterday.  “But on a score central to responsible economic development for everyday New Yorkers — creating good jobs that strengthen local communities — City Point is failing.” Read More

By Al Barbarino 1/14 3:19pm

Manhattan Market Report

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Education Sector’s Manhattan Office Space Surges With Monster Deals and Expansions

Though it still makes up just two percent of the Manhattan office market’s total inventory, a number of significant deals have caused a surge in the education sector’s Manhattan footprint.

A report from CBRE attributes the 47 percent jump in office space leased by the sector – between 2005 and November 2012 – to a growing residential population, increases in enrollment at universities, campus expansions, greater availability and lower asking rents in sections of Midtown South and Downtown. Read More

By Al Barbarino 1/03 12:00pm

Sales Beat

1511 Third Avenue

TIAA-CREF Pays $60M for 1511 Third Avenue

TIAA-CREF has purchased 1511 Third Avenue on the Upper East Side from Related Companies for $60 million, sources tell The Commercial Observer.

The 60,000-square-foot property is a four-story landmarked building, one block south of East 86th Street, the main retail artery in the neighborhood. Read More