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The Commercial Real Estate (CREW) Network last night lauded 20 Under 40 women from throughout the commercial real estate industry as part of its 20th anniversary celebration. The awards, unveiled during the organization’s 2009 CREW Network Convention & Marketplace in Boston, honor women age 39 or younger working within a qualified area of the industry and considered a “woman to watch” and likely to be an influential leader in the industry.

Plagued by the global recession that has slashed both business and pleasure travel, the hotel market is suffering on an international level and investors have backed away from buying or building in most locations, with a few exceptions–like Brazil. According to a new report by real estate services firm Jones Lang LaSalle Hotels, the positive long-term growth forecast for Brazil is popping up on the radar of those who are in the position to invest. Brazil’s hotel market hasn’t gone unscathed in the widespread economic downturn, however, it continues to have comparatively good numbers and desirable fundamentals. Devaluation of the…

A new report by Real Estate Econometrics, based on FDIC data, puts the commercial real estate loan default rate at its highest level in more than a decade and a half, at least those loans held by regulated deposit-taking institutions—banks and thrifts, for the most part. The default rate soared from 1.62 percent in the last quarter of 2008 to 2.25 percent in the first quarter of 2009. That rate doesn’t include defaults on loans associated with multi-family rental properties, which Real Estate Econometrics put at 2.45 percent in the first quarter of 2009, up 68 basis points from the…

With rumors circulating of a sale price around $100 per square foot, the sale of the 66-story American International Group headquarters in Lower Manhattan likely set the bar for the biggest sale in the area market thus far in 2009.Youngwoo & Associates (YWA), a New York-based investment and development firm, together with Kumho Investment Bank (Kumho), entered into an agreement to acquire the AIG building, 70 Pine Street (pictured), and an adjacent office building, 72 Wall Street. The two buildings will total 1.4 million rentable square feet in the heart of Manhattan’s Financial District. YWA and a Kumho consortium went…

Fontainebleau Las Vegas LLC and two of its affiliates are just the latest to find themselves flat out of cash in Sin City. The owners of the 3,900-room resort, which is 70 percent complete and was set to open in October, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection today. The move came after the property failed to receive nearly $800 million in construction funding from lenders for the new resort-casino project on the Las Vegas Strip. To gain access to the prearranged funding, Fontainebleau Las Vegas LLC filed a $3 billion lawsuit in April against lenders including Bank of America, Deutsche…

Clothing retailer Men’s Wearhouse has emerged victorious from a feverish nine-hour auction of assets belonging to off-price chain Filene’s Basement, which fell victim to the retail market’s downward spiral and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in early May, just two weeks after its purchase by Buxbaum Group affiliate FB Acquisition II. Acting through its affiliate, K&G Acquisition Corp., Men’s Wearhouse put forth the winning bid of $67 million for 17 to 20 of Filene’s store leases, as well as the leases on the company’s Massachusetts corporate headquarters and distribution center, its Maryland storage facility and– possibly most important–the Filene’s…

The Chrysler reorganization and sale to Fiat, which was to have been a model of a quick turn-around, has hit a snag in the form of a court order by U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Pension funds that hold some of Chrysler’s secured loan are objecting to the goings-on, claiming it isn’t fair to them, and so petitioned Justice Ginsburg for the measure. It isn’t clear how long the temporary stay will delay the sale, or whether it will kill the sale, or whether the full court will reverse the stay in a few days. It’s unlikely,…

It’s an office trade of such a size that has not been seen in Connecticut, no less challenged by job losses and economic malaise than most other markets, in quite a while. Matrix Connecticut L.L.C. has just taken over ownership of the 1 million-square-foot Danbury Corporate Center in Danbury, Conn., from GERA Danbury L.L.C. in a $72.4 million merger transaction. The deal is a coup for Connecticut, as well as its neighbors, as it marks the largest multi-tenant office transaction in the suburban New York Tri-State area so far this year.Danbury Corporate Center’s change in ownership, orchestrated by real estate…

Plagued by the global recession that has slashed both business and pleasure travel, the hotel market is suffering on an international level and investors have backed away from buying or building in most locations, with a few exceptions–like Brazil. According to a new report by real estate services firm Jones Lang LaSalle Hotels, the positive long-term growth forecast for Brazil is popping up on the radar of those who are in the position to invest. Brazil’s hotel market hasn’t gone unscathed in the widespread economic downturn, however, it continues to have comparatively good numbers and desirable fundamentals. Devaluation of the…