From TRD New York: Investigators working for the Intelligence Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives are looking into whether Jared Kushner’s December meeting with Sergey Gorkov, chairman of the the sanctioned Vnesheconombank, was connected to Kushner Companies’ financial troubles at 666 Fifth Avenue [TRDataCustom].

Officials told ABC News that they are investigating to see if the troubled asset made Kushner vulnerable to Russian interests. The building has $1.3 billion in loans coming due in the next two years and in many years has not made enough money from office rents to cover debt payments.

“It’s very peculiar that of all the people he could be talking to in a transition period where you’ve got lots of balls in the air, that you end up talking to a Russian banker who is under sanction and who is related to Putin and has a KGB background,” said Rep. Jackie Speier (D-CA), a member of the intelligence committee. “I think the question has to be asked, was this about you trying to get financing for your troubled real estate that you have in New York City?”

Kushner, through spokespersons, has said he will comply with Congress’ ongoing investigation into contacts between members of the Trump campaign and Russian officials. Kushner’s undisclosed meeting with Russian ambassador Sergei Kislyak is also said to be a subject of investigative scrutiny.

In March, a spokesperson for the White House told the New York Times that no business was discussed in the 30-minute meeting with Gorkov, though Russian officials said the meeting was about business. Senate investigators at that time were also planning to question Kushner about financing for the tower, according to the New York Times.

In November, his father Charles Kushner met with Chinese conglomerate Anbang Insurance Group to discuss a joint venture partnership in the tower. A deal eventually fell through, however.

Earlier this week, Trump’s personal attorney Michael Cohen declined a request by investigators to provide information and may face a subpoena.  [ABC News] — Will Parker

The Duo condominium at 1755 East Hallandale Beach Boulevard in Hallandale Beach

Two government agencies in Lithuania are investigating the widow of a former prime minister of the country to determine if she and her family hid ownership of a house and a condo in South Florida.

Two Lithuanian government agencies, the Tax Inspectorate and the Financial Crime Investigation Service, are investigating to determine if Kristina Brazauskienė and her son bought a house in Coconut Creek and a condo in Hallandale Beach and, if so, where they got the money to pay for them.

Brazauskienė and her son Ernestas Butrimas deny that they bought the Broward County residences. Her husband, Algirdas Brazauskas, died in 2010 at age 77 after serving as prime minister of Lithuania from 2001 to 2006. Brazauskas also was the first president of Lithuania after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, serving from 1993 to 1998.

7433 Northwest 51 Way in Coconut Creek (Source: Realtor.com)

In March, the Lithuanian arm of the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project reported that a company owned by Brazauskienė and her son paid $220,000 in 2010 for a house at 7433 Northwest 51 Way in Coconut Creek.

Florida property records show that their company, called UAB Draugystės Viešbutis, sold the Coconut Creek house last year for $420,000. But in financial statements filed with a business registry in Lithuania in 2010 and 2011, the company disclosed no major expenditures on new assets.

Florida property records also show that her son and his father, Antanas Butrimas, who is Brazauskienė’s ex-husband, bought a Hallandale Beach condo in 2008 for $380,000. The condo is located at the Duo condominium at 1755 East Hallandale Beach Boulevard.

After publication of articles about the Florida properties in March, Lithuania’s Tax Inspectorate confirmed that it started to investigate the purchase of the Coconut Creek house and the Hallandale Beach condo.

Lithuania’s Financial Crime Investigation Service last month was pursuing a criminal investigation of Brazauskienė, her son and their company to determine if they are guilty of false accounting and tax fraud. [Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project] – Mike Seemuth

Rosie O’Donnell and her house at 3100 Flagler Drive in Northwood

Actress and entertainer Rosie O’Donnell reduced the asking price for her 5,700-square-foot house in Northwood from $6.05 million to $5.75 million.

GossipExtra.com also reported that her lower asking price is just $48,000 more than the $5.27 million she paid for the house about three years ago.

The six-bedroom house at 3100 North Flagler Drive in Northwood, just north of West Palm Beach, has 180 feet of frontage on the Intracoastal Waterway. It also features a three-car garage, a guest home, two indoor fireplaces and an outdoor fireplace.

Property records show O’Donnell paid cash for the Northwood house in 2015, the same year she sold beachfront house near Sarasota on Casey Key, near one owned by horror novelist Stephen King.

In 2013, O’Donnell sold a mansion on Star Island in Miami Beach for $12.6 million and signed a contract to buy a house in Jupiter from actress Olivia Newton-John. But O’Donnell let the contract expire without buying the house. [GossipExtra.com] – Mike Seemuth

The Gramercy Woods office park in Jacksonville

New York City-based Gramercy Property Trust sold five buildings in a Jacksonville office park for $115 million.

The buyer, Ladder Capital Corp., obtained two mortgage loans secured by the five office buildings that total about $82.3 million. The mortgage lender is Ladder Capital Finance LLC.

Gramercy Property Trust had owned the five office buildings since 2012. The biggest tenant of the buildings is Bank of America, which leases about 871,000 square feet of the space at the office park, which totals 1.2 million square feet.

The five buildings are part of the Gramercy Woods office park, a 90-acre commercial property at 9000 Southside Boulevard in Jacksonville.

The office park was built in 1989 for the old Barnett Bank, which Bank of America subsequently acquired.

Founded in 2008, Ladder Capital is based in New York City and has offices in Los Angeles and Boca Raton. [The Daily Record] – Mike Seemuth

A Coastal Collection home at CalAtantic’s Andalucia development in Lake Worth

Home builder CalAtlantic Homes held a grand opening Saturday and Sunday for Andalucia, its master-planned community development in Lake Worth.

CalAtlantic invited the public to tour four model single-family homes at the Andalucia development and its sales center at 8926 Kingsmoor Way in Lake Worth.

The model homes represent two types of homes at Andalucia, the Coastal Collection and the Vineyard Collection.

The Vineyard Collection features single-family homes that range in size from 2,000 square feet to 3,032 square feet, with three to five bedrooms and two to four bathrooms. Prices start in the low $360,000s.

Coastal Collection homes range in size from 2,420 square feet to 3,676 square feet, with three to four bedrooms and two bathrooms and a half bathroom to four bathrooms and a half bathroom. The price range for Coastal homes starts in the mid $430,000s.

Common-area amenities at Andalucia will include a neighborhood swimming pool and cabana area, a fitness center, a children’s play area and open green spaces.

Construction of the Westlake sales center is under way.

Minto Communities has started building the sales center for Westlake, a master-planned community in central Palm Beach County where the company plans to build 4,600 homes and 2.2 million square feet of commercial properties.

Minto expects to finish the 9,378-square-foot sales center by fall, which would coincide with the launch of Westlake home sales.

The Westlake sales center will feature interactive displays of development renderings along with a children’s playroom, café and interior design center.

Minto bought the 3,800-acre Westlake development site, a former citrus grove, for $41 million in 2013.

In addition to single-family homes, Minto plans to build retail-oriented town center district at Westlake, plus an aquatics center with a lagoon-style swimming pool, sports courts, a playground and a dog park.

Minto also will spend $25 million to widen and beautify a section of Seminole Pratt Whitney Road that bisects Westlake. The project will widen the two-lane road to four lanes and will add a landscaped median. Minto also has donated 4.5 acres to Palm Beach County for construction of a fire station at Westlake.

The 360-unit Montevista at Windermere apartment complex in Orlando

A joint venture paid $98 million for a two-property, 708-unit apartment portfolio in Orlando.

The  joint venture of Bahrain-based Investcorp and Los Angeles-based TruAmerica Multifamily paid $138,418 per apartment for the 360-unit Montevista at Windermere and the 348-unit Highpoint Club.

Shelton Granade, Luke Wickham and Justin Basquill in the Orlando office of real estate brokerage CBRE represented the seller of the apartment portfolio.

“We were able to leverage our successful track record and relationships to acquire these properties in what was a very intense competition,” Michael Ferai, TruAmerica’s director of East Coast acquisitions, said in a prepared statement.

TruAmerica has been actively seeking apartment investment opportunities in Florida since opening its East Coast office in Arlington, Virginia, in the fall of 2016.

The Montevista and Highpoint apartment properties each have one- and two-bedroom floor plans, a resort-style swimming pool, clubhouse, fitness center and dog park. Both are located less than 10 miles from downtown Orlando.

The  joint venture of Investcorp and TruAmerica plan extensive interior improvemnts to apartments at both properties, including the installation of faux-wood vinyl floorings, upgraded counter tops and backsplashes, and new cabinet fronts, light fixtures and microwave ovens.

The Investcorp-TruAmerica joint venture also plans to repaint all building exteriors and to renovate the fitness centers, clubhouses, signage and landscaping at both Montevista and Highpoint.

The joint venture financed its acquisition with a seven-year, floating-rate agency loan arranged by a CBRE team in Atlanta led by Richard Jordan.

From TRD New York: President Trump officially has announced the United States’ withdrawal from the Paris accord, an agreement made by leaders from nearly 200 countries around the world to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. For the U.S., this meant a pledge to reach a 26 to 28 percent reduction in carbon emissions by 2025.

Though Trump said he would “begin negotiations to re-enter either the Paris accord or a really entirely new transaction [sic] on terms that are fair to the United States,” he offered nothing further on what these talks might look like.

The overarching goal of the Paris accord is to prevent global average temperatures from rising 2 degrees Celsius (or 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) — a target that would help to curb the effects of climate change. This includes dramatic changes in weather patterns, increased likelihood of future global food and water crises and a drastic rise in sea levels.

For New York City, the latter of those effects is most concerning, particularly since in 2012, Superstorm Sandy demonstrated the havoc nature can wreak. According to current projections, sea levels could rise 30 inches by 2050 and at least six feet by the year 2100.

As a result, the city’s 100-year floodplain — areas that have a 1 percent chance of flooding in any given year — could grow to 72 square miles, up from 50 square miles today.

Sandy caused flooding in more than 88,000 buildings in the city. Private landlords suffered more than $8.5 billion in property damage, while damages sustained by the local government came out to roughly $4.5 billion.

Today, at least 71,500 buildings valued at more than $100 billion stand in high-risk flood zones. Some of the city’s biggest upcoming projects fall in current or future flood zones, including Hudson Yards, the Brooklyn Navy Yard and the World Trade Center complex.

In light of this, The Real Deal spoke to a number of scientists, academics, industry-insiders and city workers to break down the challenges New York faces and what’s being done to address them.

“Many people say ‘what’s the big deal, six feet?’” said Klaus Jacob, a geophysicist who worked on the New York City Panel for Climate Change. “Well, if you start off with six feet higher sea-level and then put storms on top of it, you don’t need a big Sandy to flood the subways.”

Though Jacob is more alarmist than most, the consensus is that action needs to be taken sooner rather than later. Chris Ward, chief executive of the Metro New York unit of AECOM, pointed out that every study on the effects climate change describes a shorter time-frame than the last.

“Sandy was a wake-up call, but I think we’re falling asleep again,” said Ward. “There are going to have to be solutions that come out of the local economy, out of the political will to reimagine the city’s edge — because it will not stay the same. It will change.”

Though some developers are taking steps to prepare for future, questions remain as to the efficiency of measures, such as raising the second floor above projected water levels. Beyond this, there are concerns over the city’s aging infrastructure and the resiliency of older buildings that may eventually be facing literal submersion.

As Jim Crispino, president and design principal of architecture firm Francis Cauffman, told TRD last year: “You can design your apartment building for a 500-year storm, but if that storm basically wipes out the city, and the power grid, the telephone grid and everything else, what’s the point?”

To hear the views of all those above and others, including Daniel Zarrilli, who heads the city’s Climate Policy and Program and NYU professor of urban planning Rae Zimmerman, watch the video above.

For more videos, visit The Real Deal’s YouTube page.

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To celebrate The Real Deal’s South Florida edition going quarterly, TRD is offering a 1-year subscription to the magazine for $35.

The subscription includes four issues of the South Florida magazine, with the newest edition hitting newsstands this June. The upcoming issue will examine the region’s biggest developers, look at incentives condo developers are using to drive sales, evaluate the area’s largest general contractors and so much more.

Don’t miss out on coverage of one of the country’s hottest markets. Click here to subscribe to the most trusted resource for South Florida real estate news.

2446 Belmont Road NW (Inset: Obama family)

From LLNYC: Barack Obama may no longer be the president, but that doesn’t mean he’s leaving Washington D.C. The ex-pres has bought the home he was leasing in the Kalorama section of D.C. for $8.1 million. [more]

Pinebrook Pointe (Inset: Jonathan Gray)

An affiliate of IMT Residential just sold an apartment community in Margate to the Blackstone Group for $69.9 million.

New York-based Blackstone paid $177,000 per unit for the Pinebrook Pointe rental complex at 3495 Pinewalk Drive, according to data from Real Capital Analytics. The 33-acre garden-style complex has about 20 three-story buildings, and it was about 94 percent occupied at the time of the sale.

IMT, a Sherman Oaks, California-based apartment operator, paid $51.7 million for Pinebrook Pointe in 2012, which means the company sold it for 35 percent more about five years later. ARA Newmark brokered the latest deal, according to RCA.

Pinebrook Pointe, built in 1989, features walk-in closets, washer/dryer units, balconies and vaulted ceilings. Shared amenities include a clubhouse, tennis court and pool.

The pace and volume of apartment sales have been picking back up in South Florida. Last week, an Ohio-based developer paid $26.7 million for a 104-unit apartment complex in Jupiter, and Electra America paid $61.2 million for a 424-unit complex in Kendall.

The purchase is also another new addition to Blackstone’s portfolio. In April, the private equity firm paid $103.6 million, or about $218,000 per apartment, for the 476-unit San Merano at Mirasol apartments in Palm Beach Gardens. Blackstone has about $32.2 billion in cash reserves to invest in global real estate, IPE Real Estate reported earlier this year. And its total real estate assets under management are worth about $101.2 billion, according to Blackstone’s most recent earnings report.

IMT’s portfolio also reaches Arizona, Colorado, Georgia, Texas and California.

IMT and Blackstone could not immediately be reached for comment.

View from street (Inset: Todd Green) (Credit- Field Condition)

Another Four Seasons at The Surf Club unit has sold, this time to buyer Todd Green, a senior managing director and portfolio manager with First Manhattan.

The Connecticut resident bought unit N-721 at the newly completed 9-acre development at 9101 Collins Avenue in Surfside, property records show.

Green’s new unit was sold by Fort Partners under the entity SC Residences Condominiums LLC, records show. The development includes a 72-room hotel, two 12-story residential towers, a private club, two restaurants, four swimming pools, cabanas, a gym, oceanside gardens and a park.

The project was designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Richard Meier and Kobi Karp of Kobi Karp Architecture & Interior Design, and was built on the site of the former private beach club founded in 1930 by Henry Firestone Club and designed by Russell Pancoast.

Records show Fort Partners paid $116 million for the site in 2012. Eleven units, not including Green’s, have closed in Miami-Dade County records since the hotel held a grand opening in March.

Condo units range in price from $3.4 million to $18 million, and in size from 1,400 square feet to more than 7,000 square feet. The average price per square foot is about $2,400, according to Fort Partners CEO Nadim Ashi.

Just last week, another unit at The Surf Club was sold to Telecommunications tycoon Rajendra Singh and his wife Neera who paid $6.8 million for unit N-715. Singh, the founder of Telcom Ventures and Digital Service Corp., owns a 13,680-square-foot mansion at 23 Indian Creek Island Road that he bought for $10 million in 2007.

In Surfside, some nearby developments include Fendi Chateau Residences, Jason Halpern’s planned luxury boutique condo Surf House, and ASRR Capital’s planned Arte by Antonio Citterio, which is just a block away from the Surf Club.

The Bibliotheque Sainte-Genevieve’s architect: Henri Labrouste.Wikipedia Commons

Like paintings and sculptures, buildings can be beautiful works of art.

We asked architects to tell us the one building that’s a design game-changer, that inspired them to become architects, or that they find stunning.

Here are 9 of the most breathtaking buildings in the world, according to people who build them for a living.

The MIT Chapel in Cambridge, Massachusetts

The MIT Chapel’s architect: Eero Saarinen.Wikipedia Commons

“I was introduced to the MIT Chapel early in my architectural education,” Laura Thomas said. “But it was in seeing it in person that I understood what architecture could be. The scale, the materials, the light — you just get the power of it. Then I began to understand what architecture was all about.”

Thomas is the president and principal of Melville Thomas Architects.

The Sheats Goldstein Residence in Los Angeles

The Sheats Goldstein residence’s architect: John Lautner.LACMA

“Known to many as ‘The Big Lebowski’ house, it’s one of those places that sits you down and makes you say ‘whoa’ because of its daring imagination,” Evan Troxel said.

Troxel is a senior project designer at HMC Architects and hosts the podcast “Archispeak.”

The Bibliotheque Sainte-Genevieve in Paris, France

The Bibliotheque Sainte-Genevieve’s architect: Henri Labrouste.Wikipedia Commons

“Completed in 1850, it is a magical jewel box of a building,” Jared Banks said. “The gray stone classical exterior hides a cavernous light-filled reading room composed of two wrought-iron barrel vaults.”

Banks is an architect for Shoegnome Architects.

Casa Mila in Barcelona, Spain

Casa Mila’s architect: Antoni Gaudi.Rob Shenk/Flickr

Casa Mila is “exuberant, context-rich, sensual, and imbued with a rich urban residential character,” Clark Manus said.

Manus is the CEO of Heller Manus Architects and a former president of the American Institute of Architects.

The Empire State Building in New York

The Empire State Building’s architects: William Frederick Lamb, Yasuo Matsui, and Gregory Johnson.Daniel Goodman/Business Insider

“I wanted to become an architect since I was 6 years old in part because of this building,” William Martin said. “My parents would put us in the car and drive down River Road and Boulevard East with expansive views of Manhattan from the back seat of our car. The antenna enhanced the value of the building … by allowing for better reception for millions of people.”

Martin is the founder of WJM Architect.

The Forbidden City temple in Beijing, China

The Forbidden City’s architects: Nguyen An, Cai Xin, and Kuai Xiang.Wikipedia Commons

“It has amazing scale and longevity of the design, complex structure, yet simple forms,” Rosa Sheng said. “My grandfather … explained that architecture is meant to last beyond one’s lifetime. It is a living time capsule of the culture for an entire civilization.”

Sheng is a senior architect at the firm Bohlin Cywinski Jackson

Fallingwater in Mill Run, Pennsylvania

Fallingwater’s architect: Frank Lloyd Wright.via/flickr

“The rigid planes of the cantilevered balconies are pure modernist forms inserted into the heart of the forest,” Bruce Turner said. “Most importantly, however, the thing that solidified this building as my favorite of all time doesn’t show up in any photos: the arrival sequence to the house. You arrive on a small country road, turn into the property, wind your way through the woods, and the house finally appears in the distance.”

Turner is a freelance architect based in New Jersey.

The Barnes Foundation Museum in Philadelphia

The Barnes Foundation Museum’s architects: Tod Williams and Billie Tsien.Wikipedia Commons

“It is highly publicized and perhaps getting too much play like a song on the radio, but when seen in person, I was truly inspired,” Lee Calisti said.

Calisti is the founder of Calisti Architecture and Design.

Notre Dame du Haut in Ronchamp, France

Notre Dame du Haut’s architect: Le Corbusier.Wikipedia Commons

“The building stands boldly, innovatively, looking to the future, while also respective its place and the past,” says Jonathan Brown.

Brown is a senior associate at JHP Architecture/Urban Design.

Renderings of Monad Terrace. Inset: Michael Stern (Credit: STUDIO SCRIVO)

Monad Terrace is restructuring its financing as its lender pursues a foreclosure lawsuit against the developer, sources told The Real Deal.

JDS Development Group, Vector Group investment group New Valley, Ackerman Development, Mink Development and others plan to build Monad Terrace, a boutique luxury project in South Beach. The project officially kicked off sales in February in the midst of a luxury condo slowdown.

Late last month, Delaware-based lender EO Monad Terrace filed the suit against Monad Terrace Property Owner LLC, in addition to McNamara Salvia Inc. and Americaribe Moriarty Joint Venture for failing to pay the $45.8 million mortgage principal on the property. The suit did not name individuals.

The LLC, led by JDS CEO Michael Stern, assembled the development site from 13 sellers, and spent more than $51 million on the 14 parcels between 2015 and 2016. The final owner sold the holdout 3,500-square-foot parcel for $9.25 million, or $2,643 per square foot last year.

EO Monad provided the loan in June 2015 and extended the maturity date to May 17 of this year.

Stern told TRD last week that Monad Terrace was restructuring its financing and plans to break ground in the next quarter. He declined to provide the loan amount or lender name, but said he was working with a big bank. Stern also declined to comment on the foreclosure suit, but a spokesperson for the developer confirmed that Monad Terrace expects to close soon on recently obtained new financing.

“During the course of negotiations with the current lender to facilitate that closing, the lender filed this lawsuit which is entirely without merit. Monad Terrace will respond in due course,” the spokesperson said.

The lawsuit also breaks down the ownership structure of Monad Terrace Property Owner at the time of the loan closing, which reveals Vector’s New Valley owns 30.38 percent of the company. The majority 69.62 percent is owned by entities controlled by Stern, Daniel Minkowitz of Mink, and Ackerman; and Zurab Zaskalko, Paata Gamgoneishvili and Evgeny Konovalov.

JDS launched sales for the 59-unit building, which will be designed by Pritzker Prize winning architect Jean Nouvel, earlier this year. Prices started at $2 million and units range from two to five bedrooms. It would mark the first building for Nouvel in Miami, who’s also designing the individual units. Kobi Karp is working with Nouvel on the design.

The South Florida Business Journal first reported the foreclosure suit.

Port Everglades

A company tied to West Palm Beach-based Ranger Construction Industries Inc. just scored a $44 million loan for a terminal amid one of the port’s most expensive expansion projects.

Property records show Port Everglades Terminal Land LLC secured the financing from BB&T Bank.

Ranger is an arm of the family-owned contracting company West Virginia-based Vecellio & Grogan. Vecellio’s previous experience includes building the Port of Palm Beach terminal in 2004, according to its website.

The mortgage covers the land at 1200 Southeast 32nd Street, on Eller Drive and on Southeast 32nd Street in Dania Beach, including Vecenergy’s new fuel terminal.

Two weeks ago, Port Everglades was granted approval by the Broward County Commission to begin a $437.5 million expansion.

That project will nearly triple its existing deepwater turn-around area, and install crane rail infrastructure for new Super Post-Panamax cranes. More specifically, it will add 1,500 feet to the port’s turn-around area that will allow for five new cargo berths and space for larger cargo ships. Moss/Kiewit, a joint venture of Moss & Associates and Kiewit Infrastructure South Co. has signed on as the managing general contractor.

Separately, last year, a nearby 11-story parking garage with about 645 spaces and 1,400 square feet of ground floor commercial space was approved by the Hollywood Planning and Development Board to serve travelers taking cruises and flights.

Last year, the port handled more than 1 million 20-foot cargo container units.

Vecellio Group could not immediately be reached for comment.

Angelina Jolie and the mansion on De Mille Drive (Credit: Getty)

From TRD Los Angeles: It’s official: Angelina Jolie is moving to Los Feliz in Los Angeles.

The actress and philanthropist closed on her purchase of the famed Cecil B. DeMille estate for $24.5 million last week, two months after it was rumored that she made a bid on the 2.1-acre spread, the Los Angeles Times reported.

The 11,000-square-foot mansion hit the market in late March for $24.95 million. The Beaux Arts-style abode, built in 1913, has six bedrooms, 10 bathrooms, a grand foyer, a formal living room, and multiple fireplaces. Outside, there is a tea house above the swimming pool, a pool house with a fitness room and a separate guesthouse studio.

Brett Lawyer and Rayni Williams of Hilton & Hyland shared the listing.

DeMille, an early filmmaker, bought the property in 1916 for $28,000 and later acquired the house next door, which used to be home to Charlie Chaplin. DeMille lived in the Laughlin Park home for about 40 years until his death in 1959, after which his family maintained it. [LAT] — Cathaleen Chen

Arts & Entertainment site and Alex Sapir

ASRR Capital and two Asian investors are planning a 1.7 million-square-foot residential, retail, and office complex at the Miami Arts & Entertainment District site they put under contract last year, according to documents filed with the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange.

Plans for the block-long site at 18th Street and Northeast Second Avenue include two towers, one rising 60 stories and a second rising 40 stories, with up to 1,200 rental units, 20,000 square feet of retail space, and 350,000 square feet of office space.

The partners closed on the $33 million purchase of the eight-parcel assemblage earlier this month. ASRR, a publicly-traded company in Israel led by Alex Sapir and Rotem Rosen, went into contract for the property in February 2016. In May 2016, ASRR was joined by two partners: the Chinese construction company CNMB International, and a Hong Kong-based public investment group, G-Resources.

“This is a huge deal,” Rosen told The Real Deal. It marks CNBM’s first real estate project in the United States, and the Chinese company’s involvement “is a tremendous testament to what’s happening in Miami,” Rosen said.

The three partners have invested a total of $36 million in the property, with an additional $3 million on top of the purchase price going towards the development of the project, according to documents filed with the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange. Each partner will contribute $12 million for a one-third stake in the property.

The site encompasses the full block between 17th Terrace and 18th Street, and between Northeast Second Avenue and Northeast Second Court, excluding the “Real Padel Miami” courts along 17th Terrace. The combined lots span 60,000 square feet, and includes 1.4 million square feet of development rights.

This will be ASRR’s largest project in South Florida. The firm made its first investment in 2015, when it teamed up with the Istanbul-based Suzer Group to buy a $40 million Surfside site. In March, ASRR bought out Suzer for $30 million and secured a $90 million construction loan to build luxury condos, to be called Arte by Antonio Citterio, on the site.

ASRR, which trades on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange, also has major holdings in New York.

2555 Lake Avenue. Inset: Elizabeth Taylor

A Miami Beach mansion in the Sunset Islands just hit the market for $19.9 million.

William Pawley and Elizabeth Taylor at the Miami Beach home

Elizabeth Taylor once lived in the waterfront property in the 1940s, when she was engaged to William Pawley, whose father developed the home. Now, owner 2555 Lake Avenue Home Owner LLC is putting the house at 2555 Lake Avenue on the market with Coldwell Banker’s The Jills.

Records show the owner is controlled by Kaloyan Stoyanov with a Geneva address. Stoyanov is mentioned in the Panama Papers database. The owner paid $15.45 million for the 0.8-acre estate in 2013. Jill Hertzberg declined to comment on the owner, but said he is European and owns properties around the world. She was the listing agent when he purchased the home.

It’s now on the market for about $2,166 per square foot.

The 9,187-square-foot home features seven bedrooms, eight bathrooms, one half-bath, a detached guest house, gym, master suite, heated saltwater pool, a summer kitchen and a private dock with about 150 feet of water frontage on Sunset Lake. It was built in 1941 and has been “painstakingly restored to pretty much perfection, but the bones of the house remain intact,” Hertzberg said. “There’s very few authentic, fully renovated modern homes that have this magnitude.”

Pawley’s father, one of the islands’ original developers, built the home for himself, Hertzberg said. Most homes on Sunset Island 1 and Sunset Island 2 are on 20,000-square-foot lots, while 2555 Lake Avenue is on 35,100 square feet on the east side of Sunset Island 2.

Last month, the creator of the South Beach Diet listed his custom-made estate at 1633 North View Drive in the Sunset Islands for $23 million, or $2,230 per square foot. The four man-made islands are west of North Bay Road and north of the Venetians.

In March, a spec home at 1826 West 23rd Street on the Sunset Islands hit the market for $17.95 million, or nearly $2,500 per square foot. Earlier this year, a non-waterfront spec home on Sunset Island 3 sold for $5.8 million, or $1,130 per square foot.

From left: Park Hyatt at One57, Expedia’s Dara Khosrowshahi and Jonathan Tisch (Credit: Park Hyatt and Expedia)

From TRD New York: President Trump’s proposed travel bans on citizens of certain Muslim-majority nations has caused plenty of concern among hoteliers. But some hospitality CEOs argue that currency fluctuations still have a greater impact on U.S. tourism.

“U.S. volumes were hurt a little bit by the strong dollar, but now that the dollar is getting weaker, that should be a tailwind for the demand coming in,” said Dara Khosrowshahi, CEO of travel booking site Expedia.

Speaking at the 2017 NYU International Hospitality Industry Investment Conference, he noted that while Trump’s speeches and policies hurt travel to the U.S. from Mexico and the Middle East, it’s the dollar that speaks loudest.

Jonathan Tisch, CEO of Loews Hotels, said he noticed an “anecdotal impact” of Trump’s policies and statements — which include the proposed travel ban, increased vetting of tourists, and public spats with the governments of Mexico, Germany, China and Australia (among others) — on foreign travel to the U.S.

In a keynote speech earlier Monday, Tisch warned that these policies could lead to a “lost decade” for U.S. tourism, similar to the years after 9/11.

“Ending this 10-year slump required a united industry effort to push for pro-travel policies,” Tisch said, according to a summary sent to reporters. “We learned some valuable lessons that we need to put into action again today.”

Tisch’s comments come after Marriott International CEO Arne Sorenson called the proposed travel ban “not good, period” for hotels in April, and Empire State Realty Trust CEO Anthony Malkin also warned of a potential “PR bruise” for the U.S.

Despite an uncertain outlook for the tourism sector and concerns of oversupply in Manhattan, the panelists claimed demand for hotel properties is still strong.

“I think the whole hyperfocus on where we are in the cycle is a little bit overdone,” said Mark Hoplamazian, CEO of Hyatt Hotels. “For the people that really matter to the marketplace,” a property’s long-term outlook is still more important than the prospect of a quick flip, he added.

Hyatt explored a potential sale of its hotel in the Midtown luxury tower One57 last year.

Sebastien Bazin, CEO of AccorHotels, said investor interest is “extremely linked” to interest rates and that low bond yields continue to push institutional capital into the hotel sector.

The flipside of continued demand for hotel properties is that is has become hard to compete. Tisch claimed “assets for sale are priced for perfection” and that Loews is not looking to buy properties at the moment. Constructing new hotels, however, still remains appealing, he said.