Author Topic: Failed Donald Trump tower thrust into GOP campaign for presidency  (Read 1010 times)

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Offline Frank Cannon

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http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/election/article65709332.html

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The buyers at Trump International Hotel & Tower said they thought they were getting a ticket to an exclusive club, a high-rise developed by Donald Trump offering a five-star restaurant, $3 million penthouses and sweeping views of the Atlantic Ocean.

What they actually got: a hulking, empty concrete shell that was built by someone else, and ran out of money long before it was completed.

The collapse of the celebrated project four years ago cost buyers millions in lost deposits, sparked more than a dozen lawsuits, and has now emerged as a campaign issue that threatens to follow the GOP front-runner through the presidential race.

“It was an outright lie,” said J. Michael Goodson, a buyer and former Wall Street investment banker who has pending litigation against the real estate mogul. “I thought the last thing Donald Trump would do was walk away.”

The project’s massive downfall embodies both the power and the myth of the Trump brand, an aura of success and bravado that attracted condo buyers and now voters.

Just days before Florida’s primary, the long-running legal dispute over the 24-story development has become a focus of public scrutiny, raising questions about Trump’s character, business practices and his associates.

Last week, anti-Trump ads on television focused on his ties to Felix Sater, an executive on the Fort Lauderdale project who was once jailed for stabbing a man with a broken margarita glass in a barroom fight. In another case, Sater pleaded guilty to defrauding stock investors of $40 million with members of the Gambino crime family.

“Trump entrusted convicts to help him run his company,” states the ad by American Future Fund. “Who would he entrust to run the country?”

For years, Trump has distanced himself from the project, stating in a deposition in 2013 he barely knew Sater and would not know what he looked like “if he was sitting in a room right now.”

He said Sater might have introduced him to the Fort Lauderdale venture a decade ago, but that, ultimately, Sater “was not involved in this job very much.”

Despite a host of sales brochures referring to Trump’s “development,” he said he was not the developer in the project, but he merely lent his name to the resort and approved design motifs.

“The word develop, it can be used in a lot of different contexts,” Trump said in sworn testimony. “We work with the developer on trying to get a beautiful product built, but we were not the developers.”

In a phone interview, Trump’s attorney said the candidate won a jury verdict in one of the cases in Broward County, and that he had disclosed to buyers that he had only signed a licensing agreement to use his name.

“All you had to do was read” the purchase documents, said attorney Alan Garten. “The disclosures could not be any clearer.”

Though most of the cases were settled by buyers in the project, the issue over the deal was pressed two weeks ago by GOP contender Ted Cruz. During an interview with ABC, Cruz said Trump’s relationship with Sater, a 50-year-old Russian emigre who runs a development firm in New York, needed to be scrutinized.

“Republican primary voters deserve to know,” he said. “In the general election, Hillary Clinton is going to shine a light on all of this.”

Sater, a former executive with Bayrock Group, a developer of the project, said in an email to the Miami Herald that he has moved on from his convictions in the 1990s and that he had “repaid my debt many times over.” He said any attempts to draw on his past to malign Trump were “pathetic and disgusting.”

Sater, who once carried a business card showing he was a senior adviser to Trump — with a Trump Organization address and email printed on the card — declined to comment on questions about the candidate. The Trump Organization said he was never a company employee, but performed work as “an independent real estate broker.” Sater is now a real estate consultant and developer.

Several buyers said they should have been told about Sater’s involvement in the deal and his criminal past. “It certainly would have put me on alert,” said Goodson, the buyer and former investment banker.

Goodson, a Duke University benefactor whose name is emblazoned on the school’s law library, is appealing the Broward County court decision that ruled in Trump’s favor in 2014.

The 75-year-old owner of Crest Group, Inc., said Trump misled scores of buyers into believing he was the man behind the project. In the end, Trump’s name convinced Goodson to hand over a $345,000 down payment on a penthouse.

He said the brochures and sales materials clearly painted Trump as head of the 298-unit project that was supposed to turn Fort Lauderdale into an international destination. In a promotional, hard-bound book sent to Goodson, the first page reads: “A Signature Development by Donald J. Trump.”


Offline R4 TrumPence

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Re: Failed Donald Trump tower thrust into GOP campaign for presidency
« Reply #1 on: March 14, 2016, 06:10:33 am »
I am confused... I went and read the whole article, and aside from the fact that in late 2007,early 2008, that condotel market started having bank problems, and rumblings of the bottom falling out of the real estate market, there is much more wrong with.

1- The first of investors would have bought in at least a year before the first shovel of dirt was moved
2-  The down payments are not paid to the developer, they are put in an escrow acct, that can not be touched unless both parties agree. Or closing occurs.
3- so the future owners would have sued the development company over escrow, which given the situation would be returned.
4- both parties must sign off with the escrow company, for the return of the money, if the escrow company can't get in touch with the developer, they must sue.
BUT THE EMD THST THEY PAID WASNOT GIVEN TO THE DEVLOPER AT ANYTIME!!? So everyone got their money back thru the court.

5- There is a gap in this dishonest hit piece. They do not mention that Conrad bought the project in 2012,when the project filed bankruptcy!!!
« Last Edit: March 14, 2016, 06:12:34 am by Repub4Trump »


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Offline Frank Cannon

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Re: Failed Donald Trump tower thrust into GOP campaign for presidency
« Reply #2 on: March 14, 2016, 06:18:08 am »
I am confused... I went and read the whole article, and aside from the fact that in late 2007,early 2008, that condotel market started having bank problems, and rumblings of the bottom falling out of the real estate market, there is much more wrong with.

1- The first of investors would have bought in at least a year before the first shovel of dirt was moved
2-  The down payments are not paid to the developer, they are put in an escrow acct, that can not be touched unless both parties agree. Or closing occurs.
3- so the future owners would have sued the development company over escrow, which given the situation would be returned.
4- both parties must sign off with the escrow company, for the return of the money, if the escrow company can't get in touch with the developer, they must sue.
BUT THE EMD THST THEY PAID WASNOT GIVEN TO THE DEVLOPER AT ANYTIME!!? So everyone got their money back thru the court.

5- There is a gap in this dishonest hit piece. They do not mention that Conrad bought the project in 2012,when the project filed bankruptcy!!!

So you are saying this is not an issue in the FL GOP Primary despite the claims of the Miami Herald?

Offline R4 TrumPence

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Re: Failed Donald Trump tower thrust into GOP campaign for presidency
« Reply #3 on: March 14, 2016, 06:23:35 am »
Yep!
I am saying, the two guys that wrote this story are either very stupid as pertains to real estate, or they thought they could turn this around to make Trump look bad. In other words THEY LIED!
Or someone gave them the story and they didn't bother to check it out!


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Offline Frank Cannon

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Re: Failed Donald Trump tower thrust into GOP campaign for presidency
« Reply #4 on: March 14, 2016, 06:39:02 am »
Yep!
I am saying, the two guys that wrote this story are either very stupid as pertains to real estate, or they thought they could turn this around to make Trump look bad. In other words THEY LIED!
Or someone gave them the story and they didn't bother to check it out!

Seems odd to me that a Presidential candidate being sued in a Ft Lauderdale real estate deal gone bad wouldn't be an issue in the FL Primary.




Offline R4 TrumPence

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Re: Failed Donald Trump tower thrust into GOP campaign for presidency
« Reply #5 on: March 14, 2016, 06:51:14 am »
Seems odd to me that a Presidential candidate being sued in a Ft Lauderdale real estate deal gone bad wouldn't be an issue in the FL Primary.

He was not sued! The development company more than likely got court letters and had to sign off on their end to release the funds held in escrow.
The whole story reaks of lies and misinformation.
Do you know how many hi rise condos in Vegas and Florida were never built or stopped construction in the middle when the banks stopped funding them?
Everyone got their escrow money back.

I am giving specific information as I am, a hi rise condo, and distressed property specialist Realtor!
« Last Edit: March 14, 2016, 06:51:47 am by Repub4Trump »


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Offline truth_seeker

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Re: Failed Donald Trump tower thrust into GOP campaign for presidency
« Reply #6 on: March 14, 2016, 03:17:10 pm »
I can't comment very much, because such a situation is probably complex beyond a few paragraph article.

It seems like he allows the Trump name to be used, as in licensing products. That does not make him the "developer" or serve as a guarantee.

Many condo projects got cancelled part way along.

What you are saying about Escrow, for deposits makes sense. However in California with agreement of seller and buyer, funds could pass through to the developer.

It would all be very complex, involving progress and completion bonds, etc. The single overriding aspect would be the collapse of the real estate market at the time.

The "project" was probably multiple corporate entities, with the protection of limited liability which that affords.
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Offline ABX

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Re: Failed Donald Trump tower thrust into GOP campaign for presidency
« Reply #7 on: March 14, 2016, 03:21:08 pm »
He was not sued! The development company more than likely got court letters and had to sign off on their end to release the funds held in escrow.
The whole story reaks of lies and misinformation.
Do you know how many hi rise condos in Vegas and Florida were never built or stopped construction in the middle when the banks stopped funding them?
Everyone got their escrow money back.

I am giving specific information as I am, a hi rise condo, and distressed property specialist Realtor!

Maybe not on this one, but on many of his properties that went belly up, he was the subject for suits, well beyond papers for returning escrow funds. In many cases, it involved fraud charges such as the GM building RICO lawsuit that has been discussed here in depth* (that George Soros was a partner in and a co-defendant) or the Trump/Talon suit in Toronto.

http://www.gopbriefingroom.com/index.php?topic=174477.0
« Last Edit: March 14, 2016, 03:27:50 pm by AbaraXas »

Offline Frank Cannon

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Re: Failed Donald Trump tower thrust into GOP campaign for presidency
« Reply #8 on: March 14, 2016, 03:23:26 pm »
He was not sued!

That's not true in the slightest. He was sued and it went to a jury....

Jury sides with Donald Trump in Fort Lauderdale condo lawsuit

http://www.bizjournals.com/southflorida/blog/2014/03/jury-sides-with-donald-trump-in-fort-lauderdale.html

Offline R4 TrumPence

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Re: Failed Donald Trump tower thrust into GOP campaign for presidency
« Reply #9 on: March 14, 2016, 07:47:36 pm »
That's not true in the slightest. He was sued and it went to a jury....

Jury sides with Donald Trump in Fort Lauderdale condo lawsuit

http://www.bizjournals.com/southflorida/blog/2014/03/jury-sides-with-donald-trump-in-fort-lauderdale.html
Frivolous lawsuit!  Plus stupid!  As I thought and TS said these are very  complex. But I had info to know, that no one lost their escrow money.
I know Fla, and Vegas have escrow rules
As for the other suits AB mentioned, I am sure if I wanted to research
All of them, there would be reasons that were either legal, or exaggerated by the media.  That's includes the Soros thing too!


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Offline ABX

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Re: Failed Donald Trump tower thrust into GOP campaign for presidency
« Reply #10 on: March 14, 2016, 09:29:38 pm »
Frivolous lawsuit!  Plus stupid!  As I thought and TS said these are very  complex. But I had info to know, that no one lost their escrow money.
I know Fla, and Vegas have escrow rules
As for the other suits AB mentioned, I am sure if I wanted to research
All of them, there would be reasons that were either legal, or exaggerated by the media.  That's includes the Soros thing too!

Definitely read the Soros one, full thread because several of us pulled a lot of research into that. It is representative of a big pattern of behavior, but this one has some big glaring differences. One, Soros was actually a financier by name in this versus how he has partnered with Trump before through his Grove Capital or Fortress investments.

Second, Trump and Soros actually initially lost this case. A $1.4 Billion (yes Billion) summary judgement was rendered against them. A different judge refused to file the verdict and instead told them they could fight the case again (which is where it is now, hung up in courts for over a decade- very odd action unless the judge was friendly to them or there were extenuating circumstances).

Third, read the way Trump's partner was accused of threatening those who filed the suit. The typical 'you'll never do business in this town again, we'll ruin you' kind of stuff.

After reading that and realizing that there are over 150 federal lawsuits of similar nature against Trump, take a look again over the comment I made on the other thread. This is how he has always done business. It is actually more difficult to find a project that didn't have some sort of fraud accusation of some level in it.

From the other thread- serious question:
Quote
Rep, I'll ask you this as a real-estate investor/broker.  Stop for a second and picture having a developer constantly coming to you to represent his properties. They are grand properties, they are glorious properties, and yet over and over, when the deal is done, none of it is what was promised to you. Not just little things, but major financially devastating deals that screwed you but benefited the developer. Imagine that over and over, that developer not only exaggerated the deals that put you in financial harm, but even went so far in some of your deals when you invoice him, to complain about your service, withhold payment, and force you to sue him for payment, generally meaning you settle for pennies on the dollar to avoid all the legal fees.

Would you continue to do business with this developer?

What if, after all this developer came to you with the biggest, most glorious deal you've ever seen. He paints you verbal pictures of the grandest development this side of Abu Dhabi.  Would you believe him? Would you take yet another chance on him even though he screwed you in every other deal you made with him?

That's exactly what he is doing now. Everything I described in the first paragraph is exactly what Trump has done to those he does business with and describes as his deal making strategy in The Art of the Deal.

I doubt you would give a car salesman a second thought if he did it to you once. Why would you consider someone even remotely like this to be Commander in Chief of the United States Armed Forces when our young enlisted men and women's lives are in his hands?


Offline EC

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Re: Failed Donald Trump tower thrust into GOP campaign for presidency
« Reply #11 on: March 14, 2016, 09:50:11 pm »
The really important question though is how is the tower polling? I hear it's on track to win Delaware.
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Offline R4 TrumPence

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Re: Failed Donald Trump tower thrust into GOP campaign for presidency
« Reply #12 on: March 15, 2016, 12:40:25 am »
Definitely read the Soros one, full thread because several of us pulled a lot of research into that. It is representative of a big pattern of behavior, but this one has some big glaring differences. One, Soros was actually a financier by name in this versus how he has partnered with Trump before through his Grove Capital or Fortress investments.

Second, Trump and Soros actually initially lost this case. A $1.4 Billion (yes Billion) summary judgement was rendered against them. A different judge refused to file the verdict and instead told them they could fight the case again (which is where it is now, hung up in courts for over a decade- very odd action unless the judge was friendly to them or there were extenuating circumstances).

Third, read the way Trump's partner was accused of threatening those who filed the suit. The typical 'you'll never do business in this town again, we'll ruin you' kind of stuff.

After reading that and realizing that there are over 150 federal lawsuits of similar nature against Trump, take a look again over the comment I made on the other thread. This is how he has always done business. It is actually more difficult to find a project that didn't have some sort of fraud accusation of some level in it.

From the other thread- serious question:

If Trump were coming to me as a realtor for condo sales or home sales [more than likely he wouldn't. He would have an in-house sales and design staff, to work upgrades and extras]
But for argument's sake he did.
Assuming we are in the East coast, we are Atty States. Meaning attys instead of title companies handle the closing. All paperwork goes to the buyers Atty depending on the contract,monies can be held by either buyers or seller's agent IN ESCROW. REMEMBER you must have buyer and seller sign off to get monies out of escrow

So let's say the project is finished  and the buyer wires the remaining funds to their Atty. and we close.....
There will be 2 checks written out. One Will be to my company for commission. And the other will be sent to the developer.

If that isn't she you are asking, then explain.

Real Estate cdevelopment at Trump's level is brutal!  There are more ruthless people than him in that business.

Now you say ,150 lawsuits, that doesn't mean they all have merit or standing. They could be as frivolous as the one I mentioned in other post.  Trump is the best known developer and brand in the world.
Licensing his brand is probably making a ton of money for him.
Plus, I am sure when he sells them his name, in the contract, I can guarantee he has a clause saying hecis not affiliated with the licensee, and is not responsible for any debts, law suits blah blah blah.
Definition:

LICENSING AGREEMENT:

Quote
A License Agreement is a document which outlines how the licensor (the party with the property) will grant the licensee (the party who is using the licensor's property). You can determine the length of use and how the property is utilized with a Licence Agreement; you can specify, for example, whether the licensee will have the right to the use the licensor's trademark on a specific product, or the right to sell or distribute the licensor's intellectual property, like computer software for example. Having a License Agreement can help set the foundation for a great business exchange.   


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