Silverstein Properties, the New York developer known for its work behind rebuilding the World Trade Center complex in lower Manhattan, has named a new president for its lending arm.
Shawn Katz, who was previously senior managing director at Silverstein Capital Partners, was promoted to lead the unit. He replaced Michael May, who’s leaving to pursue other interests, Silverstein said in a statement.
Silverstein said it started the lending business in 2018 to provide senior loans, bridge loans, subordinate loans and rescue capital to borrowers on shovel-ready ground-up construction, heavy value-add redevelopment, land and inventory loans on completed condominium projects with a focus on residential, industrial, retail and office properties. Katz joined the financing arm shortly after its start in 2018, Silverstein said.
Silverstein also promoted Tyler Hasemann, who joined the firm in 2019, to managing director.
Katz has helped “manage and expand this business” over the past six years, Lisa Silverstein, chief executive of Silverstein Properties, said in the statement, adding Silverstein Capital Partners has raised over $5 billion and financed a number of “iconic” development projects across the United States and overseas, she said.
Katz said he seeks to expand the “lending platform into a market currently facing a notable supply-demand gap in real estate financing.”
Similarly, SL Green Realty, Manhattan's largest office landlord, and Blackstone, the world's largest commercial property owner, have touted opportunities to be a lender as high interest rates have raised borrowing costs and curbed lending appetite from traditional lenders.
Silverstein's lending business has helped finance projects including the Loren at Turtle Cove in Turks & Caicos; the Loren at Lady Bird Lake in Austin, Texas; the Park on Ke’eaumoku in Honolulu; and Dock Square in Boston, according to its website. In Silverstein’s home base of New York, the company has helped finance projects including Wildflower Studios in the Astoria neighborhood of Queens; TSX Broadway in Times Square; and Brooklyn Tower, the only New York building outside Manhattan to soar over 1,000 feet tall.
Silverstein said in a separate statement to CoStar News on Monday that it and Brooklyn Tower’s developer, JDS Development, are “in settlement discussions regarding” the mixed-use residential building.
Silverstein had given JDS a $240 million loan on the property in 2019 before the development defaulted on multiple loans that led to a scheduled auction Monday, Crain’s New York reported earlier.