Macklowe Properties Inc.

A Japanese investment firm called Mitsui Fudosan is under contract to buy 527 Madison Avenue for $160 million, according to a source familiar with the deal, shattering rumors that a Chicago-based firm was the main contendor for the building.

Mitsui Fudosan is buying the 26-story 527 Madison for $225 million. Meanwhile, the Chicago-based Transwestern is under contract to take Tower 56 at 126 East 56th Street at for $160 million.

Both buildings were part of the so-called Equity Office Portfolio, which Macklowe Properties bought in early 2007 for a stunning $7 billion, putting down just $50 million and leveraging the GM Building.  read more »

A report on The Real Deal's Web site this morning cites city records showing that Macklowe Properties has borrowed $500 million against the famous General Motors building near Grand Army Plaza, which it bought for a then-record-breaking $1.4 billion in 2003.

According to the report, the company increased its mortgage on the building from $800 million to $1.3 billion in an arrangement with the company's lender, German American Capital Corp.

Macklowe has been an aggressive buyer this year. In a single February transaction the company bought eight buildings for a total of $7 billion, including 717 Fifth Avenue, Worldwide Plaza, 1301 Avenue of the Americas, Park Avenue Tower, 527 Madison Avenue, 1540 Broadway, 850 Third Avenue and Tower 56.

In the last week of January, shortly before Blackstone acquired Equity Office Properties for $39 bil  read more »

The Observer has launched a new weekly real-estate section called Location. Macklowes Ink Second-Biggest Building Buy in U.S. History "Macklowe Properties paid $1.73 billion for Worldwide Plaza at 825 Eighth Avenue, the second-largest sale price for an office building in U.S. history." Durst Signs Himself at One Bryant Park "The Durst Organization will take the entire 48th and 49th floors for a total of 61,000 square feet at the Bank of America Tower." Go to Commercial Breaks by John Koblin. No Vacancy for Stephen Ross' Related at Amsterdam Inn "Steve Wiebe's Westside Brewery Co., located at the corner of Amsterdam Avenue and 76th Street, is about the last business left on the block. Apart from the bar, only the low-budget Amsterdam Inn directly above it remains in operation on this side of the street. Both the hotel and tavern are staying put, though, which somewhat complicates things for developer The Related Companies, which has otherwise wiped out a whole strip of storefronts in ravenous pursuit of the full block." Go to Counter Espionage by Chris Shott. Mr. Bollinger's Battle Over Columbia's Harlem Expansion "It was more than two years ago, over a couple of beers at The West End in Morningside Heights, when Jordi Reyes-Montblanc first told a Columbia University official that he wanted a community-benefits agreement." Go to story by Matthew Schuerman. Stuy Town Paper to Landlord: Read This! "Town & Village's torchbearers insist that the paper never shies away from more contentious issues at Stuyvesant Town and Cooper Village, reporting extensively on neighborhood crime as well as the frequent landlord-tenant disputes that inevitably arise at any rental property, particularly one so enormous. Lately, though, the landlord-tenant stuff has taken up an awful lot of column inches." Go to story by Chris Shott. Bloomberg Administration Names Top Development Priorities "Pull up a chair in City Hall! Deputy Mayor Daniel Doctoroff gabs about Atlantic Yards, the far West Side, Bloomberg's final years in office,and Adam Gopnik." Go to The Sit-Down by Matthew Schuerman. How Pricey Co-ops Get Better Deals at Tax-Time "The city Department of Finance estimates New York's property value at $802.4 billion for the coming fiscal year, which starts July 1. It could be worth a lot more, if some in city government had their way--and if the state, which sets the city's property-tax structure, would listen. But fundamental changes to the city's property-tax structure seem as bloody likely as a new rent-controlled building along Central Park West." Go to The Lab by Tom Acitelli. Dude Descending a Staircase "Where did all the skinny spiral staircases go? That was a time. It's all over. The duplex is no longer so de rigueur. The man in the turtleneck is now a boy staring at a rectangular screen. He wears no gold around his neck. All the ornament is in the digital image, going left or right. Life has become an eternal pan, a horizontal prison. There is no secret upstairs: no murder, no spiritual ascent." Go to Interiors with Toni Schlesinger. Billionaire Flowers Seeks $23 M. Flip for Old Lycee Mansion "Billionaire J. Christopher Flowers has put the East 73rd Street mansion he bought just three months ago on the market, with a $6 million markup." Luca Luca Guy Drops $3.345 M. in Gramercy "Forty-two-year-old Luca Orlandi, the celebrity-friendly founder of Luca Luca, will have a nice new nest to feather now that his fall line has finished exhibiting at Fashion Week. According to city records, the designer has bought a duplex penthouse co-op at the Gramercy House at 22nd Street and Second Avenue for $3.345 million." Go to Manhattan Transfers by Max Abelson. They All Live in City Boxes, But They're Not All the Same "The new book High Rise Low Down is a love letter to Manhattan's better buildings, and, like most love letters, it's sappy in parts, repetitive, and ends with rosy hopes for the future." Go to book review by Tom Acitelli. Deeds and Deals "Chuck Schumer and Hillary Clinton lean on the new owners of Starrett City, and Robert Caro wouldn't change a thing about The Power Broker." Go to Deeds and Deals by Tom Acitelli and Mark Wellborn.

Whew, done already? Macklowe Properties has closed on eight EOP buildings for $7 billion. Harry Macklowe swept in and bought the buildings from Blackstone.

The only building not included? 1095 Avenue of the Americas.  read more »

Release after the jump.

- John Koblin

• Real estate investment group Leslie Dick Worldwide is suing Macklowe Properties for $750 million, alleging a "bid-rigging conspiracy" behind the sale of the stately GM Building. According to Dick, the September 2003 auction was "a fraud and a sham"--because its own $1.5b offer was passed over for Macklowe's $1.4, and because George Soros gave Macklowe $350m for its purchase. If Google search hits are any indicator, Soros and Macklowe have a combined 4,820,000-point advantage over Leslie Dick. (AP, via NY Daily News)
• Who said The Times was unpatriotic? Frank Bruni celebrates freedom: "from making a reservation a month in advance; from stuffy dress; from stilted etiquette; from a compulsory prix-fixe sequence of amuse-bouche, appetizer, main course." Liberation is found, of course, in the magic lounges of New York's haute eateries (Del Posto, the Modern, Perry St. and more.) (New York Times)
• Construction on Richard Meier's 15-story, $1,200-per-square-foot, 119-unit Brooklyn tower reaches the great halfway point. Grand Army Plaza never looked so glassily modern. (Curbed)
• Cool, hard South Korean cash finally pours into the US real estate market. Corcoran senior VP Neal Sroka gushes: the money "is astronomical." (Wall Street Journal)
• Video of the Day: NBC's Roseanne Colletti takes a very hard look at 1,000 Brooklyn listings, finds that DUMBO has gotten expensive, and suggests Brownsville as a cheap alternative. Somehow Ms. Colletti also found the time this week to uncover the news that Manhattan is still pricey. (WNBC)
• Just because a Brooklyn Assemblyperson tried to get a $500,000 home by bribing a developer with city-owned land doesn't mean we all have to toss around cruel phrases like "crime wave." Or does it? (New York Sun)
- Max Abelson  read more »
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Last month, The Observer reported on developer Harry Macklowe's recent buying spree.

In addition to purchasing a townhouse at 53 East 77th Street for $15.75 million, Mr. Macklowe reportedly plans hotel and luxury condominium developments in the East 50's.

Now, Peter Slatin reports that Mr. Macklowe has just purchased two units at The Plaza. Perhaps, not as a coincidence, the luxurious apartments face the General Motors Building, a skyscraper across Fifth Avenue that Mr. Macklowe bought for $1.4 billion a few years back.

As with the townhouse purchase, Macklowe Properties is not saying a word about the company's plans.  read more »

- Michael Calderone