Posted on 06/14/2008 4:36:36 PM PDT by Coffee200am
NEW YORK (AFP) - The iconic Chrysler and Flatiron skycrapers may soon join New York's GM Building as landmarks sold in part to Arab or European investors as the weak dollar spurs property grabs in the Big Apple, reports said Friday.
The 50-story General Motors Building, constructed in 1968 and which includes the Apple Store on Fifth Avenue, has already been sold -- for a record-breaking 2.8 billion dollars -- to US real estate firm Boston Properties, backed by investors from Dubai, Kuwait and Qatar.
The deal, concluded on Tuesday, makes the GM Building the most expensive skyscraper in the United States, according to several reports.
The seller, Macklowe Properties, had been mired in debt after acquiring seven major New York properties last year for seven billion dollars near the height of the real estate boom, before the subsequent real estate and credit crises.
According to the Wall Street Journal, the famed Chrysler Building could be next with the Abu Dhabi Investment Council, a sovereign wealth fund, in talks with a subsidiary of Prudential Financial Inc to pay 800 million dollars for a 75 percent stake in the Art Deco treasure.
Current owners Prudential and Tishman Speyer would not confirm or deny the report.
The midtown Manhattan trophy property was briefly the tallest building in the world when it was completed in 1930 until it was eclipsed the next year by the Empire State Building.
Prudential inherited the 75 percent stake in the tower when it purchased TMW Real Estate Group in 2002. TMW had bought its stake in the building the year before for 300 million dollars.
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the world's largest sovereign wealth funds, bought into US banking giant Citigroup, paying 7.5 billion dollars in November. It also acquired a substantial interest in home builder Toll Brothers, according to the New York Times.
An increased ownership stake in the Flatiron Building, built in 1902 as one of the first steel structures in the city, would be a feather in the cap of one of its shareholders, Italian building investor Valter Mainetti.
Through his Sorgente Group, Mainetti would acquire 53 percent of the building for approximately 95 million dollars, Time magazine reported.
Upheaval in the US real estate market has led to price drops in most regions of the country, and Mainetti suggested the weak US dollar made the triangle-shaped landmark particularly attractive.
"The Flatiron is expensive, but with the (cheap) dollar, it made sense to increase our share," Mainetti said in Time.
The euro was valued at 1.54 dollars on Thursday, compared with 1.33 a year earlier.
Mira Matic, a spokesperson for the property's owner, Newmark Knight Frank, confirmed that the Sorgente Group was in talks to raise its stake in the building, but "terms haven't been agreed upon and a contract hasn't been drawn," she told AFP.
All those dollars that go overseas must come back some day. Maybe the citizenry will understand that we don’t pay for things we import with money, we barter our possessions.
The money is just for keeping score.
don’t mess with the Chrysler building.
With oil at $140.00 a barrel and Europeans and Arabs buying America's prize real estate, where are all the Freepers who were cheering the devaluation of the dollar?
If the buyer and seller agree to a price, I see no reason to interfere with the sale.
foreign investment we need.
get concerned when it stops.
Well, we'll just have to be sure to call you if it comes to that.
I don't care who owns it (well, I do, but that's not my point). Just don't mess with it. Like, you know, no additions, don't paint it, or try to jazz it up. And whatever you do, DON'T move it.
LOL, it's not like they are going to take it anywhere.
I believe back in the eighties the was lots of concern about the Japanese buying a bunch of stuff. I think it actually turned out to be a good thing as it helped the commercial real estate market to rebound, I hope it does so this time.
Wow, that would be pretty cool to watch.
I remember in 80s Japanese bought lots of real estate on Manhattan (papers even said that Japanese own most of Manhattan). A few years later Japanese owners sold those buildings back - at loss.
I presume you are the owner of the Chrysler bldg... Otherwise it’s not clear how it is an investement in “we”.
Yup. The MSM were wringing their hands that the Japanese were buying America. The Rockefeller Center, famous golf courses, the list went on. Well, years later, when the currency valuations flipped, the Japanese lost their a**es and we bought back all the properties at handsome profits.
we of the united states of america
benefit from foreign investment.
In case of Chrysler bldg - how?
money.
money coming into the united states.
foreign ownership is no threat.
I wonder how much the Statue of Liberty is going for?
Even if there are laws forbidding its sale, I’m sure the right amount would cause a “re-examination” of any such barrier.
I don’t care about ownership if a bldg - it was not even mentioned by me in either positive nor negative way. Re money - it’s not “coming into the united states” in this particular case.
Exactly!
Treasured? LOL! Like calling Anheuser Busch an American icon.
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