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Kushner's Times Square Retail Set To Be Sold At Foreclosure Auction

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The old New York Times building at 229 West 43rd St. in Manhattan

One of the lenders that helped refinance a Kushner-owned retail condominium on West 43rd Street is moving to have the property sold at auction.

A Uniform Commercial Code foreclosure auction for the 251K SF condo at 229 West 43rd St. is set for June 30, Commercial Observer reports, citing an auction notice from brokerage JLL.

The auction will take place over Zoom and the property will be sold on an “as is, where is” basis. Paramount Group, which provided a $70M mezzanine loan to Kushner as part of refinancing of the condo four years ago, instigated the auction.

Kushner failed to make March’s mortgage payment on the retail space, which is in the former New York Times building, after it was late on the payments for November, January and February, Crain’s New York Business reported.

The company — led by Charles Kushner while his son, former CEO Jared Kushner, serves as senior adviser in the White House — took out a $285M commercial mortgage-backed securities loan from Deutsche Bank in 2016 on the property. Alongside Paramount's $70M, SL Green provided $15M in mezzanine financing but said in March it had divested itself from the loan.

Kushner bought the condo in 2015 for $296M but has faced a slew of troubles there. The attraction Gulliver's Gate, which rented 45K SF, closed after its parent company went out of business.

Outstanding Hospitality Management, the restaurant company founded by Todd English, filed a lawsuit against the developer in 2018 over a planned food court in the building that never came to be.