Deconstruct

Wynwood was once best known for warehouses, murals and street art. Today, it’s attracting billions of dollars from some of the wealthiest investors in Miami. The Real Deal’s Iman Elshahawi joins Hannah Kramer and Lilah Burke to unpack the neighborhood’s rapid evolution following Ken Griffin’s $1.1 billion purchase of part of the Mana Wynwood portfolio. They discuss the arrival of major office, residential and retail projects; investments tied to Amazon, Adam Neumann and other tech billionaires; and the zoning changes that helped turn Wynwood into one of Miami’s hottest development markets. They also look at what could hold the neighborhood back — including a 36 percent Class A office vacancy rate and some surprisingly significant transportation and infrastructure gaps. Later, Hannah and Lilah examine how New York’s pied-à-terre tax is complicating multimillion-dollar divorces, the latest twists in a New York real estate family dispute, Floyd Mayweather’s dropped lawsuit against Jona Rechnitz and a $47 million arbitration involving Michael Stern, Silverstein and the Brooklyn Tower.

Could Sunnyside Yard finally become one of New York City’s next great mega-developments? This week on Deconstruct, The Real Deal’s Lilah Burke and guest co-host Jake Indursky speak with New York Building Congress President and CEO Carlo Scissura about the decades-old dream of building a new neighborhood over the Sunnyside rail yard in Queens. The proposal could create roughly 12,000 homes, but first New York would need to construct a platform over the active rail yard at a cost measured in the tens of billions of dollars. Scissura explains why the engineering may actually be the easy part — and why bringing together the federal government, New York State, City Hall, the MTA, Amtrak, local elected officials and the surrounding community could prove far more complicated. He also discusses lessons from Hudson Yards and Pacific Park, how long a project of this scale could take and why early community involvement matters. Later, Indursky explains the real estate paradox behind Brooklyn and Queens’ so-called “Commie Corridor”: neighborhoods that have produced enormous amounts of private housing while increasingly supporting politicians skeptical of the real estate industry. Plus, the latest on Marty Burger’s return to dealmaking, Mitchell Kossoff’s release from prison and the upcoming sentencing of the Alexander brothers.

The multifamily syndicator boom promised everyday investors a piece of the real estate gold rush. Then interest rates rose — and some of the biggest players began to unravel. This week on Deconstruct, The Real Deal’s Texas Bureau Chief Jess Hardin joins Hannah Kramer and Lilah Burke to explain the rise and fall of S2 Capital and its founder, Scott Everett. Once one of the fastest-growing private companies in the country, S2 amassed a massive apartment portfolio as Everett became one of the most recognizable figures of the real estate syndication boom. Now, investors have seen equity wiped out, properties have faced foreclosure and S2 has pursued a series of increasingly complicated strategies to keep parts of its portfolio alive. Jess takes us inside the financial fallout — and describes what she found when she visited an S2 apartment complex in Dallas. Plus, Hannah and Lilah discuss the still-unopened Chobani House in Manhattan, the Ritz-Carlton residences coming to Brooklyn Heights, the Trump Organization’s latest international branding deal and the approaching sentencing of the Alexander brothers.

This week on Deconstruct, The Real Deal columnist Erik Engquist joins Hannah Kramer and Lilah Burke to explain why renovating New York City’s aging apartment buildings has become increasingly difficult. Engquist breaks down the complicated web of rules surrounding substantial rehabilitation, rent stabilization, good cause eviction and demolition — and why he argues that current housing policy can leave owners with little incentive to undertake major renovations. What happens when aging buildings need substantial investment, but the economics of fixing them no longer pencil out? Plus, Hannah and Lilah dig into one of Miami’s biggest potential real estate deals: Citadel founder Ken Griffin is rumored to be pursuing Moishe Mana’s roughly 30-acre Wynwood portfolio for between $700 million and $1 billion, potentially setting the stage for a massive tech and AI campus. Also this week: Charles Cohen plots a South Florida comeback, Hackman Capital loses the $160 million Sony campus in Culver City, and the hosts look back at the real estate industry’s stories from September 11.

New York’s luxury rental market is reaching astonishing new heights. SERHANT broker Peter Zaitzeff joins Deconstruct to explain who is paying as much as $150,000 a month for homes in Brooklyn and Manhattan, why tech and finance wealth is fueling demand, and how the city’s severe inventory shortage could push rents even higher. Zaitzeff also argues that the luxury market does not exist in isolation: Record-breaking deals at the top can influence asking rents across the city, making an already expensive housing market even less affordable. Later in the episode, hosts Hannah Kramer and Lilah Burke examine dramatic new depositions from developers Meyer and Joseph Chetrit, who are facing more than $160 million in personal judgments. The testimony depicts a real estate empire that has run out of money — although lenders may question whether the brothers are overstating their financial distress. Plus, Florida considers a proposal that could eventually eliminate property taxes for homesteaded homes, and former New York governor Eliot Spitzer gets approval to advance his Fifth Avenue condo project after suing the state.