Tom Acitelli

In a CNN interview scheduled to air late Wednesday afternoon, noted McCain supporter Donald Trump says that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi should have moved to impeach President Bush following the start of the Iraq War:

"I was surprised that she didn't do more in terms of Bush and going after Bush," Mr. Trump said, according to a preview from CNN. "It was almost — it just seemed like she was going to really look to impeach Bush and get him out of office, which personally I think would have been a wonderful thing."

In the same interview, Mr. Trump praises Senator McCain's running mate, Sarah Palin, whom he met Tuesday night at a New York fundraiser: "I can only go by the people of Alaska. She's got the highest rating in the whole Unites States, as being the most popular governor."

The interest rates on so-called jumbo mortgages, those gigantic home loans New Yorkers often take because of the city's astronomical housing prices, could drop soon. From the Journal:

Over time, the government's rescue effort could make it easier for borrowers in high-cost markets such as California, New York and Boston to get a mortgage by reducing rates for jumbo loans, those too big for government backing, says Richard K. Green, director of the Lusk Center for Real Estate Development at the University of Southern California. Rates on fixed-rate jumbo loans currently average 7.91%, according to HSH Associates, more than a full percentage point above rates on conforming loans eligible for government backing, which jumped nearly a third of a percentage point Tuesday to 6.6%.

The London housing market has gone ka-blooie. Real estate brokers in the British capital report the slowest pace of business in 30 years, according to this morning's Wall Street Journal.

London's real-estate agents sold an average of 8.3 properties apiece in the three months ended in September, according to the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors. That is the lowest tally for any region of the country since the survey started in 1978. In Britain as a whole, agents sold an average of 11.5 properties during the three-month period, down more than 50% from a year earlier.

My colleague Oliver Haydock has a column in The Observer's latest print edition about what would happen to the Manhattan housing market if all those previously flush Europeans split. Bad times, folks. Bad times.

By 2006, the peak of the recently deceased economic boom, nearly 1.8 million New Yorkers—more than one-fifth of the population and the rough equivalent of three Bostons—were between the ages of 20 and 35, according to census estimates. About three in 10 Manhattanites fell into that age range.

Many, of course, came from college, where their shiny eyes had been trained raptly toward the world capital of finance, media and culture. In 1970, 19.5 percent of New Yorkers in their 20s had college degrees, according to a census analysis by Queens College sociologist Andrew Beveridge. By 2005, that percentage had more than doubled.  read more »

An East Side townhouse, wine grotto included, lists for $45 million.

Sign of the Times: An I-banker walks away from a Park Avenue discount.

Moby and friends sell a $4.35 million loft to NFL owner.

What happens if the Europeans stop investing and buying in Manhattan.

Wonk Jonathan Bowles on the financial crisis and the middle class.

Bloomberg faces biggest test since failed stadium on Willets Point.

Gary Barnett's building a big hotel in Hudson Square.

Mondo Kim's building on St. Mark's sells for $20 million.

A nonprofit gets some lawyerly space at 1675 Broadway.

The city's construction workforce is dwindling to late 1990s levels.

Charlie Palmer opening new Aureole in Durst's One Bryant Park.

The lines above come courtesy of last week's third-quarter Manhattan office market report by Cushman & Wakefield. Anyone following at home knows the market's taken a grim turn (more here from the current Observer). The asking rents per square foot above are likely peaks for Midtown, Midtown South and Downtown's top-flight, Class A space. At least for a long while.

Sports are feeling the chill of the financial crisis, according to this morning's Wall Street Journal. That includes plans for the new Mets and Nets arenas in Queens and Brooklyn, respectively. Looks like their namesakes just beat the clock!

Within the past two years, Citigroup Inc. and Barclays PLC have signed deals to spend more than $300 million over the next 20 years to put their names on sports venues in New York City -- one of them under construction, the other on the drawing board.

Citigroup will lend its name to Citi Field, the new home of baseball's New York Mets. And the NBA's Nets hope to occupy the as-yet-unstarted Barclays Center arena in Brooklyn, N.Y.

Both banks, which have been pummeled by a freeze in the markets they depend on for funding, would be hard-pressed to justify such an expenditure today...

"A French colleague who spends a lot of time in NYC just backed out of a condo deal." ["Mighty Euro Tumbles to 16-Month Low Against Mighty Dollar"]

"Though a Southern Californian, I lived in Boston from 1993 until 2002 and believe the Boston experience with slowed, or stopped, gentrification may provide some insight into what could happen in neighborhoods like Prospect Heights. In the late 1980s, a period of renovation and gentrification pervaded through the neighborhoods of Metro Boston. In the early 90s this process stopped, leaving even neighborhoods like Beacon Hill with a patchwork of updated and dilapidated row houses and condo conversions. Buyers like I took advantage and bought when the market sagged, selling when (in the early 2000s) the market had come back." ["What Happens When Gentrification Rolls Back"]

"Don't be fooled by the postcards your friends send you. The rich and the poor are basically all that remain here. Few poor own any form of real estate so they're not contributing in the way of property taxes. The 20-something students certainly aren't contributing to this place. It's a topsy-turvy town right now. Generally, only the affluent own real estate or those who purchased it eons ago. ... Tourism is the primary reason SF exists today and that's becoming increasingly difficult to maintain. I don't see how NY could use SF as a model. Ironically, many San Franciscans look to NY as a model." ["Should New York Look to (Urp!) San Fran?"]

The euro tumbled to a 16-month low against the dollar on Friday, dropping to $1.3258, compared to a record high of $1.60 as recently as July. While this might be good news for New Yorkers tired of the tourist clog, the euro's slide could be particularly bad news for a Manhattan housing market that until recently relied on foreigners for up to one-third of its new-condo buyers.

If the Western Europeans (including the British, whose pound has also dropped against the dollar) find themselves more and more on parity with American spenders, will they still buy so much so nonchalantly? Just askin'.

Book retailers, including Borders and Barnes & Noble, are pumping up financial advice books, often displaying the titles in store windows and at key points around the selling floor. From the Wall Street Journal this morning:

"It's been a hot category since the crisis first hit," said Michael D'Agostini, [Borders'] business-book buyer. "We are reordering more in order to keep up with -- and get ahead of -- the demand."

Barnes & Noble Inc., the nation's largest book retailer, said it has sent a list of titles appropriate for the current crisis to its 796 store managers, and has suggested they set up displays where appropriate. A company spokeswoman said that sales of such titles are going up.

This demand for financial advice books comes on the heels of an ebb in consumer desire for books on how to strike it rich in the housing market.

At least one Joe Six-Pack is not a fan of Sarah Palin.

"This is an old Republican ploy to try to relate to the common man," said Don Russell, who's been writing a beer column for the Philadelphia Daily News as "Joe Sixpack" for more than a decade now. (More people know him as Mr. Sixpack than Mr. Russell, he says.)

"The Republican Party, its interests are not the same as the common guy," Mr. Russell added. "Their interests are far from that, but politically they need this so-called regular guy. So that's what she's trying to appeal to. It's a classic tactic."

But, of course, the Joe Six-Pack whose endorsement Ms.  read more »

We learned that:

• There's unfinished condos haunting McCarren Park.
• Douglas Durst had to add another digit to the national debt clock.
• Advocates and critics continue to spar as the Willets Point vote nears.
• Mort Zuckerman's not too fond of the Wall Street bailout.
• Columbia bought a warehouse in its West Harlem expansion footprint.
• Manhattan's office vacancy rate's expected to climb into double digits.
• CB Richard Ellis is the new leasing agent for the Hearst Tower retail.
• Sex shops and dominatrix schools are weathering the recession.
• Brooklyn open houses are empty.
• The city picked General Growth to lead a team to build big on East 125th.
• REBNY pegged the average city home sales price at $783,000.
• CBRE wants everyone in commercial real estate to calm down.
• Sam Chang wants to build a 25-story hotel on West 36th.
• Lehman's ex-mortgage banking chief bought a 10-room condo.
• The city projects fewer tourists this year than last.
• The city's environmental commissioner joined Trinity Real Estate.
• Former Deputy Mayor Dan Doctoroff hired a former Spitzer deputy.
• NBC Universal keeps mulling its midtown office options.
• MTV promised contest winners a stay at "luxurious" Hotel Penn.
• A new Web site tracks New Yorkers' carbon footprints.
• Gentrification has started to roll back in some neighborhoods.
• Prices are jumping for four-bedroom Manhattan co-ops.
• New operators are making plays for Scores' buildings.
• A lawyer wants to flip an East 65th townhouse for $15 million.
• Two Lower East Side apartment buildings traded for $170.8 million.

The New York Post's Chuck Bennett and Rick Calder report today that Atlantic Yards developer Bruce Ratner and other project backers have "funneled" at least $680,000 to nonprofits set up and championed by Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz. Mr. Markowitz, of course, remains one of the downtown Brooklyn project's biggest cheerleaders. (He last year purged a community board opposed to Atlantic Yards.)

Mr. Markowitz, who either wants to be borough president for another four years (should term limist be repealed) or mayor, told the Post he was "absolutely proud of everything" his nonprofits had done for Brooklyn. Two of the nonprofits organize concert series, and the other promotes tourism and cultural events.

From The Real Deal:

A flailing former Citi Habitats sales agent, Leif Lopez, was busted for allegedly scamming an apartment hunter out of $100,000 in a phony transaction negotiated at Starbucks.

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Well, that is that. We wrote in this week's print Observer that the reign of landlords atop the Manhattan office market has decisively ended. The credit crisis wounded it, and the financial meltdown of last month finished it off. Further proof above from Cushman & Wakefield.

Companies leased 15.7 million square feet of office space in the first nine months of 2008. Barring a year-end bump, the total number of square feet leased will likely not exceed that in 2003 and maybe--just maybe--2001, making 2008 the paltriest year this decade for office leasing.

Midtown south, that region of heavily commercial Manhattan from roughly Houston Street to 42nd Street, may be the crystal ball for New York's financial health. It has a lot of the island’s cheapest office space; and, yet, that same space is emptying slowly as companies trickle out sans successors.

Midtown south’s scruffier buildings—think old Silicon Alley hangouts hastily rewired 15 years ago, groaning under the weights of sporadic upkeep and old infrastructure—have considerably lower rents than midtown’s gleaming towers: In September, the average midtown south asking rent was $52.86 a square foot, according to CB Richard Ellis; in midtown, it was $84.  read more »

Forget Charles Dickens. For America's retailers, it's looking more like a Charles Darwin Christmas.

The Journal's Miguel Bustillo and Ann Zimmerman go on to detail the dismal sales that retailers nationwide expect this holiday shopping season. Such low expectations spring from September sales reports: Sales at stores open at least a year dropped 12 percent annually at J.C. Penney and Dillard's, and 9.6 percent at Nordstrom. The nation's largest retailer, Wal-Mart, saw annual sales growth in September of just 2.4 percent, below expectations.

Chilly.

Yale economist Robert Shiller, author of the recent The Subprime Solution: How Today's Global Financial Crisis Happened and What to Do About It and the now immortal Irrational Exuberance, praises Suze Orman in a Wall Street Journal op-ed this morning. The relentlessly sunny Ms. Orman, like only a few other financial gurus, warned people of the current calamity should they not be careful about their property investments.

She was not the first to warn of the housing crisis. In fact, in her 2005 book, published at the height of the housing boom, she says "a home is flat-out the best big-ticket purchase you will ever make" and she gives no warning of the housing debacle we have since observed. But to give credit where it is due, she did warn in that book that adjustable rate mortgages "can become a nightmare soon after" when rates reset upwards. She warned readers not to accept lenders' judgments about how much is OK to borrow. Moreover, she provided detailed advice about the total cost of owning a home with advice to "set your own budget."

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"I hope he chokes on the payments and winds up on the street!" ["Congrats! Lehman's Ex-Mortgage Banking Chief Nabs 10-Room Condo for $5.25 M."]

Manhattan's luxury apartment boom ending amid a glut of pricey homes.

The director of Superbad buys a Tribeca condo.

Urban expert Joel Kotkin sees New York's post-boom future in San Francisco.

A third Bloomberg term will spell trouble for Mike's big building projects.

How the financial crisis will spawn a roommate renaissance in Manhattan.

Meet the '08 commercial power brokers!

A London bond firm gets a New York footprint at 444 Madison Avenue.

Parks Department horse stables return to Central Park.

Landlords' grip on the office market ends decisively in the summer.

Manhattan Community College scores a big lease at 25 Broadway.

Communist bookstore Revolution toasts Wall Street's collapse.

From The Real Deal:

The number of incoming Brooklyn home hunters from outside of New York State increased over previous quarters, according to a third-quarter Downtown Brooklyn report looking at prospective renters.

More would-be renters were looking to move to Brooklyn from out of state in the third quarter than in previous quarters. ... Twenty-six percent of Brooklyn apartment hunters in the third quarter were from out of state, compared to 20 percent in the second quarter.

That was the average New York City home sales price in the third quarter, according to a new report from the Real Estate Board of New York. That's down from the last two quarters but up slightly from the same period in 2007.  read more »

Just north of the Financial District, ironically enough. According to a Forbes magazine analysis, the zip code 10013, which covers most of Tribeca (as well as some of Soho, Little Italy and Nolita) is the most expensive within New York City and the 14th most expensive nationwide.

It is holy writ at this point that foreign money props up Manhattan's investment sales market. With $7.4 billion spent, foreign investors accounted for over 40 percent of all Manhattan building and property portfolio sales in the first nine months of 2008, according to numbers out today from Cushman & Wakefield covering deals of at least $10 million. That's a jump from the $5 billion during the same time in 2007.

But foreign economies, particularly in Europe, are starting to crumble. Iceland's just about bankrupt. Germany and Belgium have had to do their own bank bailouts. Spain's housing bubble burst this year. And has anybody else noticed that $1 now equals 1.  read more »

Location: Where is New York headed now that its main economic engine, financial services, is on the rocks? Do cities normally survive when the main employer, job generator, income generator, goes belly up?

Mr. Kotkin: Well, in the case of financial services, it’s less a job generator than an income generator just because the jobs are such huge providers of income. Basically, New York has been on what you could call the ‘plutonomy wagon.’ Plutonomy is a term used to describe the intersection of plutocracy and economy. So New York has been the ultimate trickle-down economy—it’s been a relatively small group of people driving the economy.  read more »

The investigations of at least three U.S. Attorneys into whether Lehman Brothers misled investors before its fall could include parsing the former investment bank's vast commercial real estate investing operation. From the Wall Street Journal this morning:

The U.S. attorney's office for New York's Southern District, in Manhattan, is investigating whether Lehman valued its assets at artificially high levels, say two people familiar with the matter. That office has issued subpoenas to individuals that focus on what the firm told investors and other parties about its valuations for approximately $32.6 billion in commercial-real-estate holdings, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Lehman's commercial real-estate portfolio came under review by a number of firms, including

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The Miller Samuel-Prudential Douglas Elliman third-quarter Manhattan housing report's now online (PDF).

To read about the sagging Manhattan condo market click here; to read about the troubled luxury market click here.

CB Richard Ellis has gotten the nod to be the exclusive leasing agent for the Hearst Tower's last two bits of retail space. The bits cover 14,720 square feet at Eighth Avenue and 57th Street.

CBRE snagged the assignment from archrival Cushman & Wakefield.

Release follows:  read more »

The above chart from Colliers ABR says it all about the Manhattan office market as it enters 2008's final stretch. Vacancy rates, including for top-flight Class A space, continue to rise as asking rents remain flat. The Wall Street crisis, damaging as it is to one of Manhattan's prime office leasers, financial services, won't help matters in 2009.

The projected 80,000 to 90,000 in office-based job losses between now and the end of 2009 could be enough to drive the Manhattan office vacancy rate well into double-digit percentages. A new report from Colliers ABR predicts the rate could rise to somewhere between 12 and 13 percent, well above the September rate of 7.4 percent, as companies shed space after shedding employees.

But there's two things working in the market's favor (and the favor of landlords and landlord brokers):  read more »

From the Journal's breakdown of what a green roof is and how to get one: "The amount of green roofing in New York more than doubled to 123,074 square feet from 2004 to 2007, according to surveys by Green Roofs for Healthy Cities-North America Inc. That is an area roughly equal to about 10 Olympic-size swimming pools."

Michael Immerso, author of Coney Island: The People's Playground, wrote in the Wall Street Journal this weekend a conditional endorsement of the Bloomberg administration's Coney Island plans:

New York's goal of making Coney a year-round tourist destination is worthy of support -- but not in a way that leaves insufficient space for seasonal attractions and amusements that have become synonymous with Coney Island. The city hasn't yet struck a proper balance. Under the current plan, too little land is allotted for the outdoor amusements, arcades and game stands that have long been Coney Island summer staples. The redevelopment zone comprises some 47 acres, and with the right zoning there can be ample space for year-round attractions without confining classic Coney Island amusements to a fraction of that area.

Then there's this beautiful historical context:  read more »

We learned that:

• The Prospect Park Y's chief sees possibilities in the financial crisis.
• A new hedge fund signs a pricey lease in 1095 Avenue of the Americas.
• Luxury condos will replace two West 23rd Street buildings.
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"Hugo Chavez loves his job too. The Mayor is making a mockery of our system. He should be ashamed of himself and so should any sycophants kissing up to him to grab the crumbs off his table." ["Speyer, Zuckerman Back Bloomberg Bid"]

From Douglaston Development, developer of the Edge condo in Williamsburg:

 
Aware that Sarah Palin loves being able to see Russia from her home in Alaska, the developer of The Edge, the largest new condominium development rising in Brooklyn, is wondering whether the Republican Vice Presidential nominee might like to check out some dramatic views closer to the mainland.

Just hours before the start of the Biden/Palin debate on October 2, 2008, The Edge hoisted a giant 100-foot by 28-foot banner at its construction site in Williamsburg.
 read more »

Mega-landlords Jerry Speyer and Mort Zuckerman told The Times' Michael Barbaro they'd love to see a third Bloomberg term. It would help the local economy in troubling times, their reasoning goes--besides, what else would their friend Mike do with his time?

According to Mr. Zuckerman, chairman of Boston Properties, controlling owner of the GM Building, among other trophies:  read more »

New York Times: Concern for 2009 as Manhattan Real Estate Market Slows

Associated Press: Manhattan Apartment Sales Drop Further

Bloomberg: Manhattan Apartment Sales Drop as Prices Extend Five-Year Gain  read more »

By this time Friday morning, the blogosphere and the dailies will be rat-a-tat-tat-tat abuzz with what's happening or not in the Manhattan housing market. The Corcoran Group and PropertyShark.com, Prudential Douglas Elliman and Miller Samuel, StreetEasy.com, Halstead Property and Brown Harris Stevens all plan to spill their third-quarter findings into the public sphere.

What to watch for:  read more »

"The trend of young families did not occur because real estate was affordable in the city, rather it occurred because the city had become a desirable place to live. With the pending economic crisis, the state of the city is less clear. As tax dollars rapidly disappear, the question should not be on the cost of living, rather it should be on the quality of urban life as this is what truly matters to upper class, young families." ["No Rest for the Expecting Marrieds"]

Tucked into Charles Bagli's gong-rattling New York Times pronouncement on the end of the local real estate boom were three gems to illustrate the point.

HSBC pulled out of a major lease at Larry Silverstein's downtown gem:  read more »

"And the Bush administration and Hank Paulson are asking for taxpayers' money to keep these very same guys filthy rich? I vote NO! for the bailout plan. Have Buffett and the billionaires of the world inlcuding the Arab sheiks invest in America, but please please do not use taxpayers' money! If America falls apart, then ask these guys to return the millions of money they did not deserve!" ["Park Places! Lehman COO Sells His for $4.4 M., Ex-Bear Asking $12 M. Farther Up"]

Dana Rubinstein has the backstory on Mark Walsh, the star Lehman executive who orchestrated the bank's myriad commercial real estate investments. To some, Mr. Walsh is the hidden wizard behind Wall Street's demise. To others, the 48-year-old Fordham Law graduate just had really bad timing.

"Who are they kidding? If the problems would only stop with $1.7 billion, it would be OK. The Freedom Tower isn't practical, and the memorial also. And what about security costs on the site because of the so called streets? What's the Calatrava about anyway? What garbage the public is buying." ["$1.7 B. in Overruns at World Trade Center Site"]

An AIG executive vice president pays $3.45 million in cash for Central Park pad.

Democratic fundraising giants sell on Park Avenue for around $37 million.

Lehman's ex-president sells his Park Avenue co-op for $4.4 million.

Inside the World Trade Center redevelopment timeline.

Young couples expecting become New York's newest most desperate buyers.

Speaking of buyers: It's their kind of market in the outer-boroughs.

What will replace bank branches as our ubiquitous city retail?

A Chelsea developer gets financing right before the bottom drops out.

Calvin Klein to debut his first furniture line at the Soho Mews.

The Sun's leaving 105 Chambers. Who gets the newspaper's office space?

Neil Rubler on the Wal-Mart approach to New York's affordable housing.

Saucy Aussies Danae and Dustin Cappelletto take over embattled 19 Kenmare.