By Jotham Sederstrom 2/29/12 3:22pm

Sit-Down

Woody Heller. (Illustration by Joao Maio Pinto)

Woody Heller on Investment Sales and New Demand for Lower Manhattan

The investment sales market, most brokers agree, has been heating up over the past 12 months. Approximately $25.8 billion in commercial properties changed hands last year, a turnaround that represented an 88 percent increase over 2010. But while the positive uptick is easily verifiable, what happens next for Manhattan’s investment sales market is still up in the air.

Accordingly, The Commercial Observer set out to speak with the real estate industry’s most accomplished capital markets and sales practitioners to learn what’s in store for 2012. Over the next several days, we’ll post interviews with heavy hitters like Richard Baxter of Jones Lang LaSalle, J.D. Parker of Marcus & Millichap, Darcy Stacom and William Shanahan of CBRE and Peter Hausperg of Eastern Consolidated. But, first, after the jump, none other than Woody Heller of Studley.

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By Carl Gaines 2/29/12 2:41pm

Investment Sales

Illustration by Peter Lettre.

Medium Cool: Investment Sales Volume Spiked in 2011, but Future’s Still Cloudy

A self-described car guy, Woody Heller, executive managing director and head of the Capital Transactions Group at Studley, sees parallels between automobiles as hard assets and commercial real estate investment sales velocity in New York. Apart from the obvious luxury to be found in cars and Class A buildings alike—his 33-million-square-foot transaction volume likely doesn’t include a jalopy—both markets have also lately been bolstered by similar factors.

“With debt available and with interest rates so incredibly low, it encourages one to buy because money is so cheap,” he said. “If the asset class is in favor compared with what much of the alternatives are—if borrowing costs are incredibly low—it continues to steer people to want to invest in hard assets like real estate.” Read More

By Daniel Geiger 1/24/12 11:08am

Postings

1173 REBNY 116th Annual Banquet, 1.19.12

Walking the REBNY Ballroom: Hungry Brokers, Angry Lapidus

Speeches were casually ignored, drinks were spilled and bonds were formed at last Thursday’s 116th annual Real Estate Board of New York Gala, which this year drew an estimated 2,000 brokers, owners, advertising buyers and real estate reporters to the New York Hilton for an evening of conviviality, honorifics and hushed deal making. Among the fray was Commercial Observer staff writer Daniel Geiger, who during the course of the evening saw his stenopad tossed by an irate real estate broker and who unabashedly accosted Studley’s Woody Heller in the hotel’s bathroom, all for the sake of the story. Below, a timeline of gala comings and goings, from the innocuous gossip down to the downright obnoxious.  Read More

By Jotham Sederstrom 2/22/10 8:50pm

The Puzzle Solver

When it was announced last week that the coveted Drake Hotel site had been sold for $305 million to the California-based investment firm CIM Group, mum, apparently, was the directive.

Indeed, neither a peep nor chirp emanated from CIM Group or seller Macklowe Properties, which had accrued $540 million in loans at Read More