The Sit-Down

Location: How long have you been working with your father, David?

Mr. Walentas: Since ’97.

And before that you were with Donald Trump?

For a year.  read more »

Location: About six months ago you released an Ian McKellen-narrated video of what downtown Brooklyn would look like in five years. Given the current economic turmoil, would you release the same video today?

Mr. Chan: Absolutely.

The video cited $9.5 billion in private investment—that included Atlantic Yards?

That includes Atlantic Yards.

So you still think Atlantic Yards will happen?

Yeah, I think it is in the process of happening.

All 16 towers and arena?

The Atlantic Yards was always a project that was conceived as taking a few economic cycles to fully realize itself.

 read more »

Location: Last year you did $1,129,126,981 in loans, which makes you the biggest mortgage broker in the country. How is that possible during such a massive economic crisis?

Melissa Cohn: Well, 2007 happened to be probably the biggest year in real estate for New York City, and I was certainly a beneficiary of that. I mean, it was the highest-grossing year for real estate in any year that’s ever been recorded. I certainly have benefited from the increase in the value of real estate in New York City.

 read more »

Location: After more than 60 years as a stand-alone midtown Manhattan restaurant, you’re opening a second Patsy’s Italian Restaurant in … Atlantic City?

Mr. Scognamillo: We can’t be more excited, and the partner that we’ve found at the Hilton Casino, they are just as excited as we are.

This was so important to us, because, really, it’s our little baby; I mean, we have our little baby here and we want someone to be taking care of it and nurturing it and treating it the right way.  read more »

Location: Your family has been involved in real estate for decades, owning various commercial, industrial and residential buildings throughout New York City. But a shopping mall? Retail is a new frontier for the Hemmerdinger clan, no?

Mr. Hemmerdinger: The interest in retail is all me.

What’s the allure?  read more »

Location: In your bid for mayor, as of January, you’d raised $180,000 compared with more than $4 million by one of your potential opponents.

Mr. Avella: I consider that a virtue.

People use the term ‘long shot.’

I agree. Absolutely. I’m bucking the system; I have been since 2002. I’m the independent voice. … The real estate industry, which is the biggest contributor giving to people for higher office, they aren’t giving to me.

How many hours a week do you work?  read more »

Location: Your new book, Creating Central Park, asserts that the park was a testament to democracy, lowercase ‘d.’ But it wasn’t born of it. Can you explain the vote for the park and the general push for the park?

Mr. Heckscher: I would like to start by saying that the whole issue of the park has to do with open space in Manhattan. Central Park is, shall we say, the conclusion of 50 years of political machinations of how to provide, for the city and Manhattan, open space mostly for health reasons—for air and space for the health of the public, and recreation.

Why hadn’t it been done beforehand?  read more »

Location: We’re probably in a recession, and a big culprit is the housing market—prices were much too high, and now they’re really sinking. As the nation’s largest luxury home builder, do you feel guilty?

Mr. Toll: I feel guilty for not being more cautious and recognizing that we had to be on thin ice because things had been so good for so long. [But], by 2000, we should have entered the next down cycle, on an ordinary basis. But we didn’t. And if I had become cautious then, my company would have missed the great ride that it took in ’05 and ’06. In ’05 we made $800 million plus—net, net, net!  read more »

Location: You represented a London-based oilman when he bought two penthouses at the Plaza, a triplex and duplex that will close next month. The Times reported that the price is $56 million, but I’ve heard it’s $53.5 million.

Ms. Sample: That’s correct. There probably will be some additional purchases that go along with that … for staff.

Ms. Powers: They had an hour and a half to spend with us, they were like, ‘pick out the best.’… One is facing Fifth Avenue, and one is facing Park Avenue.

That was a record-breaking contract price, but only for about a few seconds—before developer Harry Macklowe paid around $60 million for a Plaza sprawl. Was your buyer upset?

Ms. Sample: You know what? He doesn’t really believe that Macklowe paid $60, to be honest with you.

Have you been approached by new owners at the Plaza to put their places up for sale for nine digits? The rumor is that some people want to flip for as much as $100 million.

Ms. Sample: One hundred to $110 … and we were offered $150 million for the two apartments at the Plaza that we haven’t closed on yet! And do you know what our guy said? He said, ‘I wouldn’t sell it for $300 million.’

That’s crazy! He hasn’t even seen the apartment yet because the renovations aren’t ready. How does he know he won’t want to sell?

Ms. Sample: Look, if someone is worth $5 billion, they don’t care.

But isn’t it crazy for people to be so wealthy?

Ms. Powers: Good for them.

Ms. Sample: Good for them. That’s the democratic way. I’m not a communist. If you work hard, and it’s legitimate, why shouldn’t you?

I reported that you just sold a $15.85 million apartment at the Time Warner Center, and that the seller, whom you represented, was known as ‘the psychic hot-line king,’ the man behind the fraudulent Miss Cleo.

Ms. Powers: I had no idea.

Ms. Sample: No, we didn’t.

Do you look into the backgrounds of the people you work for?

Ms. Powers: Not always. I mean we look at the company, the biography, but not into every single detail.

Ms. Sample: Well, what psychic hot line would ever be legitimate, quite honestly? I’m sorry, that would be my answer to that.

Not to nitpick, but in 2004 you listed Tyco CFO Mark Swartz’s Ritz-Carlton duplex for $28 million, after Tyco’s downfall.

Ms. Sample: We cannot discuss that. … We were hired by the corporation after the indictments. So that’s the answer to that question.

Is your attitude here that it’s about the real estate, not the people? Or do you worry about where your clients’ money comes from?

Ms. Sample: Yes, we do, absolutely. … We’ve had governments that are not in favorable standing with the United States, shall we say, that we’ve been contacted by. … When I first started in the business, I was almost kidnapped by a guy that was wanted by Interpol … for arms smuggling.

Ms. Powers: Everything is questionable when you deal with that much money. We’ve dealt in the past with huge casino owners; now, that alone is questionable. Next Page >

Location: You’re now one of four teams left vying for the West Side rail yards, down from five. How do you feel about your chances?

Mr. Durst: I think we have a 25 percent chance. … We think we have the best bid in terms of planning and the financial terms for the M.T.A. [the yards’ owner].

How long of a build-out would there be on the site?  read more » Next Page >

Location: How did you guys decide to be partners?

Mr. Grieco: My wife.

Mr. Canora: Well, we worked together at Gramercy Tavern for a while, and then when I left to open Craft, his wife, Katie, was the opening [general manager] of Craft. So, she and I had a close relationship, because she worked the front [of the house] and I was in the back. I was chomping at the bit to do my own thing, and she obviously knew that he had it in the back of his mind also.  read more » Next Page >

Location: What’s the bigger accomplishment: The underdog New York Giants beating the undefeated New England Patriots to win the Super Bowl? Or, New York’s tourism industry rebounding after 9/11?

Mr. Tisch: I would say, for different constituencies, the accomplishments are about the same, and, actually, some of the lessons are the same. The lessons are that by working together, by putting aside your individual concerns, by always understanding the greater good, you can accomplish a lot.  read more » Next Page >

Location: Every day seems to bring more news of the aftereffects of the credit crisis spawned by the subprime mortgage defaults. Can you connect the dots between those defaults and the lack of fresh lending for commercial property buys here right now?

Mr. Mosler: I think it’s difficult to connect the dots in precise terms, but clearly we continue to see the fallout from subprime. We haven’t reached the bottom, which we had all hoped to do by now. Personally, I think, as it relates to subprime, we’re not that far away from reaching the bottom, which is the most important piece of this.  read more » Next Page >

Instead of finishing community college, Ben Shaoul bought up his first building at age 19. Eleven years later, he controls over 1,000 rental units, is finishing up three new condos, and is about to erect his first hotel.

Location: You’re 30 years old, but you have over 1,000 rental units, including a big new development at 636 East 11th Street, and you’re constructing the A Building condo two blocks up, the Yves luxury condo in Chelsea and another nearby on West 22nd Street. How?

Mr. Shaoul: I started working as an intern for a realty management company when I was 19 years old. I had already dropped out of college, after approximately one year—I went to a community college in Miami, and then I took some more classes at Baruch. … The people I was working with, they said, ‘Why don’t you go buy a building?’  read more » Next Page >

Location: What do you think about the concept behind the city’s plan to rezone 125th Street, where the city wants to allow for significantly more development along much of the corridor?

Mr. Stringer: It’s one of the more famous streets in the world and a rezoning is appropriate. But this community needs much more than just a sliver rezoning, so we need to think beyond 125th Street.

Is it feasible to think that you could both revitalize Harlem but also avoid displacement?

That is the single biggest challenge I have as borough president. … My pledge to the people in the borough was yes, I recognize that the skyline is going to change, and it should and needs to, and I’m going to support that change. But I’m also going to do it with community participation.

On the West Side, you’ve advocated making 33rd Street a passageway for pedestrians, partially closing it off to cars. … What’s the reasoning behind it?

Part of what we want to do is create open space—the challenge for Manhattan is to marvel in our tall buildings, but at the same time create pedestrian space and walkways.

How would you rate the job of Dan Doctoroff, the former deputy mayor for economic development and rebuilding, now that he’s gone?

I think that Doctoroff and his team, and the mayor … set a very high bar and a high standard as to what is possible for the city. They recognize, as I do today, to think big and to take on big projects and entice people to think about the changing skylines of the city. How you balance community and thinking big has been the challenge of the last few years, and I think he will be judged kindly by history.

Yes, he had missteps, and obviously the stadium was not the finest moment, and he overplayed the Olympic hand, but the bottom line is, he is the first deputy mayor in memory who we will actually be able to say he left an imprint on the changing skyline of the city—and not just in Manhattan.

How would you change the property tax structure?

Right now, vacant property is taxed at a lower rate above 110th Street than south of 110th Street. The reason there is that way back when, 20 years ago … a lot of landlords abandoned property and left New York, leaving the city to own those properties, and no one wanted to tax them because they knew everybody was on shaky ground. Now that we have development way beyond 110th Street, we should change that.

So a higher tax discourages a landlord from sitting on it?

The public interest is not served by having a tax distinction above 110th Street right now. And with a city that’s going to need a lot of revenue, that makes a lot of sense.

There are still a lot of projects that are out there that the Bloomberg administration is still implementing as we speak—do you think all of them will get in the ground before the mayor leaves office?

I think every administration wants everything all nice and tidy before they leave. I think the mayor has already established his legacy on major projects. I think if a few take a little longer, if we need to take a close look at some, I don’t think that hurts the legacy, I think that’s just smart urban planning. I’m not on a deadline; I don’t think you have to operate that way.

Do you wish the borough president’s office had more definitive power, like it used to?

The city charter gives me a say in land use and development, and in any measure, we have taken that advisory role and fundamentally changed the way this office is perceived. … So it doesn’t matter whether I serve on the Board of Estimate, or [that] the job may have been more powerful 50 years ago. It’s 2008, this is the hand I’m dealt and we’ve made the most of it.

What do you think about the position of public advocate? Next Page >

Location: Steve, you’re opening a second Magnolia Bakery on Columbus Avenue this week, and Danny, you just opened a second Mermaid Inn on Amsterdam Avenue this past November. Both of you used to live here on the Upper West Side. What is it about the neighborhood that brought you back for these new endeavors?

Danny Abrams: I think that we both knew the neighborhood about as well as anybody did. And we both felt—at least I did—that there was a lack of good places to go. And the demographic has changed and the neighborhood has kind of evolved over the years. The people who were 25 and living in very cheap apartments are now a little bit older and married with children.

Steve Abrams: Including us!

Danny: And we’ve both owned businesses up here over the years. It’s just a really wonderful market for what we do.

What other businesses?

Steve: I own a construction company, high-end residential construction, Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous sort of stuff. My clients are Samuel Jackson, Annie Leibovitz, Jeff Gordon …

Does Sam Jackson have snakes in his apartment?

Steve: No. Seriously, we have a long history in this business. We started as young guys, so we opened a bar because that’s what’s you do when you’re 25 or so. The bar was called Wildlife at 77th and Amsterdam Avenue. After that, we both jointly opened a dance club together called Live Psychic. And then we sort of split up. And I opened a restaurant called Flowers on 17th between Fifth and Sixth. And Danny started to take over the Upper West Side a little bit and opened up a place called Prohibition and then a place called Citrus. I came back to the neighborhood and opened a place called It’s a Wrap. And then I got out of the business for 10 years. And Danny went on a tear. …

Danny: I didn’t go on a tear, but I opened a bunch of joints.

Right. The Mermaid Inn among them.

Danny: Opened the Mermaid, opened the Red Cat, opened Harrison, opened a restaurant called Pace. About a year ago, I bought everybody out of the Mermaid Inn so I could sort of expand that, the way I felt it should be expanded.

Why did you focus on that particular concept?

Danny: I just felt like it had more potential to be a neighborhood joint than the high-end restaurants that I was doing. If I wanna be a part of the neighborhood, you have to be a certain price point. The price point that would be O.K. on the Upper East Side, it would be O.K. in Chelsea, it would be O.K. on the Upper West Side, so that I could have four of those in Manhattan, of all the same name.

Is it hard to be a neighborhood place when you have several locations in different neighborhoods?

Danny: No, I think it’s actually kind of easier because, if you have one location, then you might draw people from all over the city. When there’s two of them, the people from the Upper West Side that are thinking, ‘Let’s go to the East Village and go to the Mermaid Inn. Eh, I don’t wanna go down there, it’s a $15 cab ride. I’ll just go to the one around the corner.’ So it’s easier to focus on the neighborhood, when you’ve got more than one.

What is the difference in real estate terms between downtown and the Upper West Side?

Danny: The rent, the size, the number of seats are all pretty similar. I think you’ve got to be patient to find the right opportunity. I could have taken a more expensive place on Broadway, or further down on Columbus Avenue or Amsterdam. But it didn’t work with the price point that I have. I’d have to charge more money.

Steve: Amsterdam versus Broadway is the difference between a mercenary restaurant and a neighborhood restaurant. [The new Magnolia space] is exponentially more expensive [than the original]. I bought [the original store] last year, inherited a very reasonable rent. But I think that Magnolia was a victim of its own success downtown. When it went in 12 years ago, it got a very good 12-year lease with good rent. Next Page >

Location: You’ve been warning of a national real estate collapse since 2005. Do you feel vindicated by last year’s downturn?

Mr. Shiller: Well, I don’t like to use the word vindicated, but it is unraveling as more or less I expected.

When your S&P/Case-Shiller index of home prices came out last year showing record drops, you said things hadn’t been this bad nationally since the Second World War. Yet the sub-prime mortgage scandal hasn’t much affected Manhattan. Are we immune?

Firstly, you’re definitely not immune, OK? Manhattan is a unique place, and that does mean that it has different dynamics, but it’s not immune, I can guarantee you that … If it gets too expensive in New York, people will leave it, no matter what—they can’t afford to live there. And so it’s just not true that New York will keep appreciating independently of everywhere else, I just don’t believe it. Elementary economics say people will always substitute away when the price gets too high, and so they’re doing that.

What will the bursting of the real estate bubble in New York look and feel like?

It will probably start showing synchrony with the rest of the country, and it will happen very gradually, it will start slowing down. If we’re going into a recession, it won’t be that exceptional, people won’t be that surprised.

Our real estate boom since the 90’s is unrivaled, you’ve said, even by the post-war baby boom. So would it be normal, even desirable, for it to end?

It would be a great thing for New York if prices came down, because more interesting people would move in. Your artists can’t afford to live there anymore … They’ll move out of Brooklyn, they won’t be anywhere nearby.

You’ve suggested the Internet boom was ‘a silly, in fact embarrassing fad.’ But will the New York City real estate obsession ever die?

Did you know that the world financial center [of the 1600’s], Amsterdam, created a second city called New Amsterdam? And it’s the world financial center today. Amsterdam hasn’t gone up! It’s the satellite city, called New York now, that’s replaced it … New York will set up satellites; we’re starting to do that with Greenwich and Stamford and I don’t know where else, and it doesn’t have to stay there. The idea that it’s just going to keep going up, especially with the Internet age, which makes communications more easy, I just don’t think it’s reasonable to think it’s just going to keep getting more and more expensive.

So we’ll be replaced?

That’s right. People like urban living, I think we’ll see a movement toward building more urban centers. Manhattan is a symbol for a kind of living that people find very attractive … [Scholars] are arguing that zoning has to be rethought. We have to create new Manhattans, there’s a demand for them. It’s too expensive in Manhattan, there’s no reason why we can’t have a brand-new one somewhere. We just have to build it, plan it all out, a planned city, put it somewhere where land is really cheap, on the coast somewhere with a good location.

A New Yorker wouldn’t believe the city would be replaced! ‘Boom psychology’ is the egoism that investors get during good times. When that dissipates, it’s bad for the economy. So can New York’s cockiness be a good thing?

No, I don’t think it’s a good thing. I think it has encouraged people to push prices up too high, and that creates all kinds of distortions. Unfortunately people have trouble maintaining an even keel; we go through waves of optimism and then maybe excessive pessimism.

If New York’s unique, even among the so-called superstar cities, what’s our kryptonite? What could potentially bring us down?

I was just in Charlotte, North Carolina, at the Bank of America headquarters, and they moved their headquarters from San Francisco. Why did they do that? Because it got so awfully expensive in San Francisco. Of course San Francisco is another superstar city. I asked people [who relocated to Charlotte], ‘Do you regret it?’ What do you think they said? They said ‘No, I have a two-acre lot, and I have a horse, and we just love it here’ … There’s always going to be something unique about New York, but you know sometimes these unique places are surprisingly not expensive.

I’m 23 and making under $30,000, and so of course I hate the expensiveness of this city. And yet I think you’re underestimating New York.

It’s a little bit like Rome. I don’t know if you’ve ever read what Roman historians say: People in that city, I’m talking about ancient Rome, there were poets who extolled it, it must have been an amazing place. I wish I could go back in a time machine, it must have been something! The Roman Empire centralized on Rome more than the U.S. does on New York; in fact their whole country was named after Rome … They definitely had great feeling for that city, and it’s still there, and it’s still a neat city. But it went through some bad periods, if you look at history: Really bad periods when it fell into decay! So it’s kind of up and down, and I think that’s the typical history of cities. Rome has not always been expensive.

What’s the psychological factor to a real estate bubble?

The human species is very empathetic; they connect with each other … We get the excitement—you get a sense of excitement of a boom. I was in Silicon Valley in the late 90’s, and I was at the hotel breakfast, listening to people at the tables, they were hatching these excited businesses, all sitting on the edge of their seats. There was a sense of euphoria, and it does infect everyone else. Next Page >

Location: The Real Estate Board of New York launched in September ResidentialNYC.com, which it billed as ‘the first comprehensive Web site enabling homebuyers to link to thousands of exclusive home listings in New York City.’ How is it the most comprehensive? Can you explain the scope?

Mr. Spinola: It’s very simple. Our members share their listings with each other … and right now, over 70 of those firms—which have about 50 percent of the exclusive listings in Manhattan and in sections of Brooklyn—are on our Web site. And so, if you go to this one location, [there’s] well over 4,000 listings on any given day; and they are constantly being updated so that there’s no listing on there that’s a bait-and-switch on there.

So, it is comprehensive in that you can go to this one Web page instead of going to 70 to find [a listing], and it is the most accurate because there are no stale listings, there are no phony listings, which some Web sites have. … And these are all exclusive listings.

Is it larger than the Manhattan Association of Realtors’ multiple listing service?

Oh, it’s not even close. It’s much larger. How do I say this? They have 13 firms that are members of the Manhattan whatever it is, and most of them are members of the Real Estate Board of New York.

Are the Corcoran Group and Prudential Douglas Elliman, the city’s two biggest residential firms, on ResidentialNYC.com?

They’re not.

Is there a timeline for them joining?

The timeline is they can come on anytime they want to. And I think as we go through 2008, they’ll recognize that it’s working. The average time being spent on our Web site is nine minutes. We’ve had well over five million hits, whatever that means. The hit concept is a ridiculous concept, but, putting that aside, we’ve had 50,000-plus unique visitors to our Web site since we’ve launched.

Is there a plan right now for Corcoran and Elliman to come aboard?

We’re continuing to talk, and they’re looking at how successful it’s going. They’ve both said to me that they think the Web site is terrific.

Real estate right now is one of the more robust industries in the city. Does the increased prominence of real estate dilute the necessity of REBNY? In other words, what’s the fundamental role of REBNY right now?

Well, the answer is a flat no to that specific question. If anything, people believe that REBNY is at an all-time high in terms of its involvement and its ability to convey the concerns of the real estate industry.

I used to jokingly say that when things are going great my members felt great and left me alone; and when things were going bad they felt they desperately needed us. But the truth of the matter is even in great times there’s problems. And, in the increasing activity of government—meaning, there are a lot of pieces of legislation put forward that deal with real estate that the Real Estate Board has to deal with, and that’s whether we’re in good times or in bad times. In fact, some of it may be encouraged more in good times.

Can you give some examples of legislation?

We’ve had all kinds of legislation in the year, from a new building code, the international building code that we had to give input on and feedback on, which our members volunteered to take a look at.

We’re concerned right now about a harassment bill that the [City] Council is talking about that would permit the individual tenant to have a right to go directly to court to claim harassment rather than the current process, which says that you have to go to [the Department of Housing Preservation and Development], and HPD would determine if there’s real harassment before you go to court. The result is, you’re going to have a lot of unnecessary legal costs because you’ll have lawyers knocking on doors and saying, ‘We can go and challenge your landlord because he once asked you where your rent was.’

There have been constant bills that have been pushing to mandate that people pay prevailing wages—or union—whenever they build something. … My membership pays prevailing wages in almost 99 percent [of construction projects], but we question why government should be dictating that; and it clearly raises serious concerns for the construction of affordable housing in the boroughs if you’ve mandated that provision. Next Page >

Location: Can you talk about the West Side rail yard bids—are the financials in a range that you expected them to be?

Mr. Spitzer: We are pleased with the bids as they came in—in terms of the magnitude financially, the scale of the proposals, the creativity, the involvement of some of our most prominent real estate companies and private-sector employers who want to site headquarters there. … It reflects and justifies our confidence that if we did an RFP [request for proposals] for that site, we could elicit great response.

How is having an anchor tenant going to help a developer? Is it reasonable to expect that whoever is selected would have a tenant?

I don’t want to say anything that would be deemed as influencing the analysis of the bids, just because not every one of the bids has a prominent anchor tenant yet; but I think, historically, if you look at major developments of that sort, having an anchor tenant certainly is viewed by financing entities as demonstrating the long-term success that makes financing a development such as that more possible.

Does the state expect to merge some of the bids?

Both too early for me to say and wrong for me to comment on, just because this is a process that the [Metropolitan Transportation Authority] will run.

Which is your favorite based on design?

Deep inside me I may have views on that, but it’s certainly wrong for me to pass judgment in any way.

Generally, do you think you’re in a tougher position now to ask the Legislature for funding for initiatives than you were at the start of your term?

To the extent that we are now facing a deficit that is portrayed against the economic uncertainty that we have staring us in the face, absolutely. It is one thing to feel confident that you can grow yourself out of momentary deficits; it’s another thing to be worried that if revenues this year are a bit softer, how will they look next year.

And politically?

It’s not so much a political decision; it’s really a numbers decision.

You’ve pledged not to raise taxes, but do you think you will turn to raising fees around state government?

Fees move up sometimes in areas where they are used to cover particular expenses of agencies that depend upon them to pay for their budget. That is usually part of the budgeting process, but that is very different than a tax increase, and fees move in a different way.

Has progress come slower than you expected generally with economic development initiatives?

No. Actually, we’re pretty much on track. I’ll give you some examples of policy shifts that have moved extraordinarily well: The 20 percent cut in workers’ comp rates, which was a billion-dollar savings to businesses every year in perpetuity. … The property tax cut we got done; some of the infrastructure development projects—Ground Zero, where we negotiated a $2 billion settlement to all the insurance claims, and that has been very important in terms of providing the capital for that rebuild. It got the JPMorgan Chase deal to Building Five [on the World Trade Center site, where the former Deutsche Bank building stands]. Building Five obviously has some problems that we’re dealing with in the deconstruction, but that has been moving very well. With Moynihan [Station]—we’re having great discussions. Hudson Yards, the RFP is out; we’re moving that at least as quickly as I ever thought we could.

I feel there is a frustration within the industry at least about some projects, such as the proposed expansion of the Javits Convention Center and Brooklyn Bridge Park.

Javits—sure, that’s been a tough analytical process. Brooklyn Bridge Park is a question of financing, but we’re moving forward on that, we have good leadership there, so we’re getting there. … Big projects are difficult to navigate sometimes.

For Moynihan Station, developers Related and Vornado stand to make hundreds of millions, if not billions, on the Pennsylvania Station project and surrounding development. How much do you think they should contribute?

I’m not going to put a number on the table. What I will say is that we’ve had good conversations with the development team. It is a project that we are all committed to getting built because, first, what we the public get out of it most fundamentally is a rebuild of Penn Station.

Right now, as an entry point to the metro region, the existing Penn Station is certainly not what we would desire. It’s—the metaphors I use I’m not sure I want printed. … When you go down into the depths of Penn Station, you feel that you’re descending into one of Dante’s levels of hell. … We’re in the midst of a negotiation with the developers, and we’ll come to a middle ground that I hope is fair to everybody. They will do well on the development, and that’s great. If they weren’t going to do well, we wouldn’t get the millions of square feet of office, retail and residential space built; and if they weren’t going to do well, we wouldn’t be able to afford to rebuild Penn Station. Next Page >

Location: So, Gregory Peck, is that your real name?

Mr. Peck: It is indeed my real name. My parents made a horrible assumption, which was that, when I got older, people would not remember or recognize the name.

Any relation to the movie star?

No relation.

Now, you’ve had the privilege of working for some of the hotel world’s heavy hitters. Before starting on your own, you worked with André Balazs.

I did. I worked with André for a couple of years, doing acquisitions, mainly focused on the two properties in Miami, the Raleigh and the Standard Miami.  read more » Next Page >

Ms. Stribling: The lobby you’re entering now has the original mosaic floors of the Plaza that were created in 1907—we just celebrated our 100th anniversary. They’ve really been polished and brought back to their splendor. … We echo some of the mosaic work in the bathrooms and the kitchens of the residences. This is the complete private entry lobby for the residences. It shows you the original check-in concierge desk for the hotel, and it will be dedicated to the residences now.

Location: Can you describe the marketing of the Plaza? What were some of the biggest assets used to market it? I imagine it wasn’t difficult.

Marketing, quite frankly, is always difficult. … In the case of the Plaza Hotel, the Plaza itself was its own iconic image. But what we had to do was tell the public that they were not buying the old Plaza, the former Plaza, the faded splendor of a grande dame.

They were going to be buying into a new place, a rejuvenated Plaza that would maintain the absolute allure of this legend—and, yet, would be a fresh, up-to-date entity with a lot of vitality, with a buzz. … And that was not the case for the last 10 years; that was not the case for the last 20.

What happened?

It had become, quite frankly, dowdy. It had become run-down. And it had become faded.

Stribling & Associates has affiliations in Europe and you live part-time in France.

Correct! I’m lucky enough to have a home in the south of France and an apartment in Paris.

Given the strength of the British pound and the euro and even the Canadian dollar at this point, how reliant is the luxury market in New York on foreign buyers?

The top of the luxury market does not seem to be relying on the foreign buyers at all. When I say ‘at all,’ most of our luxury, luxury top-end real estate is in the co-op sector; and the foreigners are not really buying the beautiful Park Avenue, Fifth Avenue co-ops. That said, there certainly are a lot of foreigners who are investing in condominiums, whether for investment purposes or for their own dwellings. I would say that probably one-third of the condominium sales within the past 18 months has been made by foreign nationals.

Why aren’t foreigners buying co-ops?

Well, first of all, in many instances, you have to show that you’re not using this as a pied-à-terre, that you have enough assets in the United States. Most foreigners do not want to give their financial statements in full; it’s a requirement of co-op boards.

So, the credit crisis and all the problems in the mortgage markets—that’s not affecting the luxury market that much?

We have actually seen continuing bidding wars. We seem insulated from a lot of the credit crunch across the United States; and I think, quite frankly, that the very rigors to gain access into a co-op building and the rigorous requirements of our [condo] developers here—where you’ve got to put down 10 percent and another 10 percent after a certain period of time and, in some instances, a full 25 percent—you cannot, of course, sign those contracts until they’ve closed.

The Plaza, speaking of foreign buyers, has a lot of Russian and Russian-American buyers …

So the media tells me! But not according to my sales contracts.

How many are there—Russian buyers, specifically?

I think we have several Russian families in the building but no more than that.

How many is several?

I think ‘several’ usually refers to three.

And what are some other blocs, so to speak, of foreign buyers?

Well, first of all, I think you’d be interested to know, 63 percent of our purchasers are United States citizens; and that leaves just 37 percent that have been purchased by foreigners. The majority of our United States buyers have come from New York City, and California is the second. So I’m pleased to say that New Yorkers have given an outstanding vote of confidence to the Plaza.

Have people started moving in?

We have, to my knowledge, several families who are living here; very few. We have already closed 50 percent of our deals and many of the decorators are at work.

As The Observer and other media have reported, there’s been at least two purchases in the Plaza by single buyers of at least $50 million, which would make them the most expensive apartment buys in New York City history. I understand that Stribling is known for its discretion, especially on marketing high-end developments like this, but The New York Times reported that one of those buyers is the developer Harry Macklowe. Is that true?

Well, you’ve very rightly said that Stribling is known for its discretion. I’ve made a career of it, and I like to protect all my buyers. Next Page >

Location: Could you generally talk about what you tried to accomplish with your bids for the West Side rail yards?

Mr. Barnett: When we started to look at it, to us it became clear that any project that talks about having the massive platforms that would be required to build substantial buildings over the working railways is going to be extremely difficult to succeed … We took a very, very different avenue, which is to use bridge technology—it’s technology that has been used in other uses elsewhere, but we’ve adapted it and are using it here to essentially bridge over the rail yards… So besides having the enormous benefit of not interfering with the Long Island Rail Road and making sure that commuter operations are uninterrupted, it is also way, way less expensive.

How much do you think you could save?

We would not want to disclose that now, but it is certainly in the hundreds of millions

Your architect, Steven Holl, told us that you gave him permission to do a design of his liking, setting aside the design guidelines from the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the yards' owner. Why have you chosen to go down that path?

Because we know Steven Holl very well and we knew that if we didn’t give him permission, he’d do it anyhow.

Many, I think, have seen the plan as architecturally bold, but something of a long shot—do you think that’s fair and how do you think the MTA will receive the bid?

Why do you think we’re a long shot?

I would think that you’re viewed as not one of the traditional titans, and don’t have an anchor tenant.

The truth is that the developers here are really the who’s who of New York real estate to a large extent, and I don’t include us in that who’s who. … Our project works, it can get built, the financial parts of it make sense, and I think that it’s superior just on its merits; but looking at the qualifications—Extell currently has under development in excess of 5 million square feet, with at least another 5 million square feet planned down the road. … I don’t think any of the other partners have that much development ongoing … I think we’re a long shot because I haven’t done enough interviews, but other than that, I think we really ought to be in the No. 1 place, both on the merits of our design and the ability to execute.

What do you think of the other bids?

They’re flawed simply because of the necessity to put the platforms over the yards, and the difficulty of doing that while there’s a working railway yard underneath. If I had to pick the design that I like personally the most—that I thought that had just straight architectural [merits]—I don’t think it’s buidlable, I’ll say that right now—but from an architectural design—I thought Tishman Speyer had a very nice architectural design.

Aside from the rail yards, do you think the far West Side will develop as successfully as the city imagines?

We haven’t seen any commercial development get going, which means that the whole Hudson Yards aren’t going yet … One has to question how fast that’s going to happen, in a big way. … There is a lot of new product, and, of course, you have the whole new Penn Station redevelopment, where, of course, Vornado and Brookfield are very active – all of which are closer in, so it’s not evident that you’re going to have enormous commercial development going on there [on the far West Side].

We haven’t even seen the same number of jobs that we had in 2000, yet we have these tens of millions of square feet of new office space on the books—could the city be overdeveloping?

There’s a lot of potential development—I don’t think we’re seeing overdevelopment. If you look at the late 1980's, there were a lot of buildings being built on spec—you’re not seeing that here… I think it will come as the market demands, and that’s probably a good situation.

You’ve chosen Steven Holl for a number of your projects now. What do you think about the state of architecture generally in the city now?

We could certainly use some very handsome buildings, well designed, with nice artistic flair. We could use some more of those, and some more master planned projects that have that great design, because at the end of the day, great architecture is a living sculpture, and it’s nice to have great artwork so that it unifies the city.

Years ago you were a diamond trader. Can you talk some about your shift into the real estate industry?

It’s been a long time ago already, probably 15 years or so, that I’ve moved substantially into the real estate industry.

You have this perception that you’ve had this meteoric rise in the past decade, so I guess I’m just trying to understand why and how.

I don’t think it’s been meteoric; frankly, it’s been step by step over a 15-year period. If you look at some of the things we have in New York, they’ve developed over the last 10 years, some of these development sites we have have taken that long to get done. It’s just that I haven’t wanted to take a very high profile, and didn’t see the necessity, but then when you tell me I’m a long shot, I figure I’ve got to do it.

Compared to a lot of the other families in the real estate industry--they’ve been around for 100 years, 80 years. What was it like breaking into that?

I haven’t seen any significant problems with that—again, it’s been a step-by-step process, and that’s kind of the way you do it. You have a better base if you go a little more slowly. Next Page >

Ric Clark, the president and CEO of Brookfield Properties, one of the city’s largest office landlords, talks about his firm’s bid for the West Side rail yards and his efforts to keep Merrill Lynch in Brookfield’s World Financial Center.  read more » Next Page >

Dolly Lenz, vice chairman of Prudential Douglas Elliman, sat down last week to talk Shvo, Trump, murder and $8,000 pocketbooks.  read more » Next Page >

As president of the Economic Development Corporation—a post Mayor Bloomberg appointed him to in January–Robert Lieber has the job of promoting economic development citywide through real estate. He’s turned his focus lately on the outer boroughs.  read more » Next Page >

Location: Your new Pop Burger outpost, scheduled to open later this month on 58th Street near Fifth Avenue, will span three floors and about 8,000 square feet. That’s a big burger joint—maybe not Times Square-McDonald’s big—but pretty frickin’ big.

Mr. Liebenthal: I originally wanted to take one floor. But the landlord told me, ‘If you don’t take the whole building, you can’t open a burger joint in my building.’ I said, ‘I’ll take the whole thing.’ As the scale of it grew, it became more and more exciting because we were able to emphasize brand identity by having the entire facade.

About the facade: All the globular windows sort of remind me of those on a submarine.

The idea was to almost blow bubbles up the building. It’s evocative of a toy. We wanted it to be very fun and playful.

Fitting for a place across the street from FAO Schwartz.

The stainless steel [storefront] also fits in nicely with Bergdorf Goodman [next door]. To be facing the Plaza, the Apple store, and FAO Schwartz, and to have my brand there, is incredibly exciting. I want to see this whole area littered with Pop Burger boxes.

Tell us about what we’ll see inside. How will this be different from the original Pop Burger in the meatpacking district?

The takeout counter [on the first floor] is fully complete. It’s its own entity. It has a separate entrance. Then the bar and restaurant [upper floors] has its own entrance.

Why the separate entrances?

For uptown, it lays out better for the crowd that will come there. I think people downtown at first were a little like, ‘What is this place?’ When you’re paying the kind of rent we’re going to be paying uptown, we don’t have much time for people to figure it out.

What kind of rent will you be paying?

We’re right off Fifth Avenue. The rent is significant.

Were you eyeballing the Fifth Avenue area specifically for your next location?

A friend of mine had walked by—he’s a real-estate developer—he told me he thought that would be a great location for me. I went up and took a look. I thought, Wow. I knew that financially it would be a very aggressive project. But I thought it was a great idea.

How financially aggressive? What sort of total investment are we talking about with rent and renovations?

Is the word ‘significant’ fair to say?

Ballpark?

More than $3 million and less than $5 million.

Meatpacking is a pretty trendy part of town; Fifth Avenue, maybe not so much. Is this pop-arty fast-food-meets-nightclub concept gonna fly up there?

I sure hope so. When I see the success of Abercrombie & Fitch, which is basically a dark nightclub that has retail in it, and how people react to it, that tells me the timing is right to have Pop Burger in that type of real estate.

A lot of what you see [at the original Pop Burger] is a riff on contemporary American art. The light wall [at the takeout counter] pays homage to the contemporary text artist Edward Ruscha. The red metal ceiling sort of pays its roots to Donald Judd. Our pool room is spray-painted with silver aluminum car paint, which Andy Warhol used in his ’63 Elvis paintings.

You’re big on Warhol.

Warhol is my favorite artist. What I liked about him was, he was all about commercial consumption and the ordinary object. It wasn’t only for the intellectual financial elites. That’s what I find exciting about Pop Burger, is creating a product that everybody across cultures—depending on where their finances are—everybody likes Pop Burger. Next Page >

Kent Swig just bought Helmsley-Spear, the building services firm once run by Leona, and he’s selling condos fast at the Sheffield. He also co-owns brokerages Brown Harris Stevens and Halstead Property as well as 9 million square feet of Manhattan commercial space. And, oh, he’s a Macklowe in-law and lives in 740 Park.  read more » Next Page >

Robert A.M. Stern, the well-initialled dean of the Yale School of Architecture, doesn’t apologize for his chauffeur’s room at 15 CPW, his suede loafers, his fondness for the past or his designing for George W. Bush.  read more » Next Page >

Mr. Zuckerman: Sit down, I’m reading about one of my favorite topics: the Middle East. I get all the articles—all the major political articles from all the Israeli newspapers. I’ve been reading it for 30 years; it’s really fantastic.  read more » Next Page >

Location: Your company has a very clearly defined mission to build mixed-income, environmentally sensitive buildings close to transit. Why did you leave your family’s business and set this one up?

Mr. Rose: Everything I do draws from the legacy of having been a partner of Rose Associates for 13 years and having grown up as a member of such an extraordinary family. The genes of philanthropy run deep, the genes of wanting to help make the world a better place. In my father’s generation, though, real estate development and making the world a better place were viewed as more or less two separate domains. I was inspired by several people—including Anita Roddick, who just passed away and who founded the Body Shop, and Ben Cohen of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream—that there was another way, that there was a way to create a business that was both a really good business, but was also socially and environmentally responsible.

I left Rose Associates with the blessing of my family in 1989 to create a business that tried to bring together social responsibility, environmental responsibility and economic responsibility.

Why were you not able to do that within Rose Associates?

Rose Associates has had a very clear format and mission. They build really great, mostly market-rate apartment buildings in Manhattan and I think they are the best in the business. I wanted to be much more geographically diverse. I wanted to be much more product-type diverse. I am deep into affordable housing. I was interested in green building back then. I wanted to create a platform in which I could develop my own ideas.

As for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s new sustainability commission, of which you were named chairman recently, why did they choose you?

You will have to ask them. I believe that they chose me because I have been a leading thinker in transit-oriented development and in thinking about the relationship between transit and regional growth. More energy typically is used getting to and from a building than by the building itself.

The typical suburban single-family house uses 115 million BTU’s of energy, but it takes 125 BTU’s of energy to get to and from it, or 240 BTU’s altogether. You can green the house and change the cars to hybrids and cut the energy some; but instead, if you took the same house and rolled it to an urban location in Brooklyn or Queens or Riverdale, the fact that so much more of the household trips are walking or transit reduces the energy used to 143 BTU’s—the combined energies of the house and transit.

If you green the house and green the cars, you’re down to 89 BTU’s, and if you make it green multifamily, you are down to 62 BTU’s. You have cut the energy budget by three-quarters. So as a nation, it is anticipated that we will grow by 94 million people over the next 30 years; we as a nation will have to decide where we are going to put those people.

If urban living is more efficient than suburban living, why are you building in Stamford, Conn.?

Well, in Stamford, Conn., we partnered with the Malkin family. They are building an office building and we are building mixed-income housing next to it, and it is literally next to the Stamford train station. So we say our goal is not just to develop in cities, but also in towns and villages—though Stamford is a city—and that what we are doing there is completely in line with our philosophy—that is, mixed-income and close to transit.

One of the items the sustainability initiative is supposed to explore is what role the M.T.A. will play in promoting smart growth strategies and transit-oriented developments, which must be right up your alley. Do you have any ideas on that?

I don’t want to preempt the committee, but the M.T.A. owns all these assets right next to their train stations that are parking lots that are ideal for transit-oriented development.

So the idea is to build on top of those lots?

It depends on the zoning of each community. It might be dense townhouses. It might be retail with townhouses above, or condominiums above, or apartment houses. It all depends, but there are certainly opportunities for dense mixed-income development right next to many of the train stations. Next Page >

Alex Sapir, 27, took over mammoth landlord the Sapir Organization from his father, Tom, in 2006.  read more » Next Page >