The triple-threat tech titans, Amazon, Facebook and Google, dominated 2018’s real estate news and earn our top Golden Brick Awards.
AMASCAM
Amazon’s sham HQ2 process, when it knew where it wanted to locate and squeezed 258 places for handouts where it may put facilities anyway. Jealous pols could still kill the Long Island City goose.
Under the radar
To Facebook for growing at Vornado’s 770 Broadway, leasing 225 Park Ave. South and seeking additional space at 1 and 63 Madison.
Good neighbor
To Google, aka Alphabet, which owns 111 Eighth Ave., leases 85 10th Ave., will lease at Pier 57, bought Chelsea Market for $2.398 billion in the biggest sale of the year represented by Darcy Stacom at CBRE and marketed through Cushman & Wakefield’s Douglas Harmon, and will take Oxford’s 1.3-million-foot project at 555 Washington and, so far, didn’t ask for a thing.
This year’s other Golden Brick winners are:
Lucky Stone
TF Cornerstone for becoming Amazon’s developer and buying a site for four apartment towers in Long Island City right before the news broke.
Biggest Winner
Brookfield, now the city’s largest property owner after buying Forest City, for its work on making Brookfield Place and Manhattan West people-friendly, for ground leasing Kushner Cos. 666 Fifth and joining with Tod Waterman to ground-lease Lever House — someday — when RFR gives it up.
Rock and a Park Place
RFR as Trepp reports Lever House at 390 Park Ave. could be foreclosed on in January by the mortgage holder. The bump in lease payments expected in 2023 and its poor relationship with the ground owners left RFR in a no-win situation.
Shell Shocked
WeWork as the tortoise that slowly takes over the world as WeDo Everything, even as 1,000 copycats nip at its flanks.
Ball Drop Goliath
L&L Holding, Maefield and Fortress for the upcoming TSX, a 46-story, $2.5 billion tower at 1568 Broadway.
Make Midtown Great Again
JPMorgan Chase for soon rebuilding 270 Park while absorbing tons of space in the interim.
Mezzanine Award
SL Green for parlaying a junior stake into a major holder of 245 Park Ave. and chipping away at leasing up One Vanderbilt.
Air Janno
Janno Lieber for ensuring the MTA bought back Grand Central Terminal and certain air rights.
Square Deal
Disney for selling its Lincoln Square sites to Silverstein Properties and soon building a new tower at 4 Hudson Square.
Industrious
Innovo for tackling warehouses everywhere.
Future World
The apps, AI and robots creeping into everyday life.
Winning Bid
The Phillips auction house for — days after the divorcing Linda and Harry Macklowe were ordered to sell most of their $800 million art collection — finally announcing it will move to the base of Macklowe’s 432 Park Ave., saving Macklowe a brokerage fee. Now, will the auction house get the sale of the family art?
Pulled It Off
JDS, Property Markets Group and Spruce Capital for 111 W. 57th St., a tower so slender it’s barely there.
see also
Comeback Kid
Paul Massey for — despite missing becoming mayor — founding a new brokerage and financing firm, B6 Real Estate Advisors.
Biggest Lease of the Year
Peter Riguardi of JLL for leading Deutsche Bank to a lease for 1.2 million square feet with Related at Columbus Circle.
Hotel Deal of the Year
Qatar’s Katara Hospitality for purchasing The Plaza.
Typo or Treat
Auto-fill for marking all the transferred Plaza units as “Timeshare.”
Theme of the Year
Amenities for office buildings.
Borough of the Year
Queens, because Amazon says it is so.
Socialist Manifesto
The city council for stomping on private property rights and the city’s property tax base but forgetting it needs the cash from those for services and to give everyone else free stuff.
Bad to the Bolt
The new Tappan Zee Bridge for having multiple bad bolts that need replacing.
R.I.P.
Gil Robinov, a longtime commercial broker and contrarian thinker, and Faith Hope Consolo, the legendary Queen of Retail quotes and quips.
