Moinian Group sues to block today’s $25M mezz foreclosure tied to Midtown West hotel

Joseph Moinian’s Moinian Group filed an emergency petition yesterday in New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan seeking to block a UCC foreclosure auction of a $25 million mezzanine loan scheduled for today at 3 p.m., court records show. The loan is secured by the equity interest of the entity that owns the Hilton Garden Inn at 237 West 54th Street in Midtown West, Manhattan. The mezzanine note holder, Twin Summit NY LLC, alleges the note originated in 2015, matured on March 1, 2025, and has not been repaid. The total amount due on the mezzanine loan, the documents say, is $32.7 million. The papers also allege the $175 million senior loan, originated in 2015, was in default.
The court records do not show any action by the court on June 9 to halt the sale. The Real Deal reported on this case yesterday.
Case LINK

Court filings represent the position of one party and are not necessarily accurate or complete.

The Moinian action says the UCC auction must not go through because of alleged misrepresentations which could lead to “unequitable consequence for sale of the interests and upon post sale consequences for the Petitioners.”

The filing alleges various misrepresentations, but only provides one example. It says the note holders “failed to clarify the outcome of certain litigation… Docket Number 18-cv-3068, [in which] the plaintiffs, though seeking $2.1 million in compensatory damages and $30 million in punitive damages, were awarded and have voluntarily accepted $10 million…by permitting potential bidders to believe the assets at issue are valued a full $20 million below their actual value, Respondents are working an impermissible misrepresentation.”
In addition, the filing says, “The request for TRO and Petition could not have been brought to the Court’s attention earlier because Respondent, until yesterday (6/5/25) continued to negotiate with the Petitioners in what was believed to be good faith.”

The property

The hotel building in Midtown West has 171,129 square feet of built space according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has frontage of 80 feet and is 100 feet deep with a total lot size of 8,033 square feet. The zoning is C6-7 which allows for up to 15 times floor area ratio (FAR) for commercial and up to 10 times FAR for residential with inclusionary housing. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $69.8 million.

Development

Scott Thrun of 237 West 54th LLC submitted a new building construction project for a 401-unit, 143,532 square-foot hotel/dormitory/shelter (R-1) building at 237 West 54 Street. The plan was filed on January 19, 2011 and was permitted on March 9, 2012. It calls for the construction of a 341-foot tall, 34-story building and was filed with the New York City Department of Buildings under job number 120583145. The project is described in the filing as: propose to erect a new hotel building as shown on drawings filed herewith.

For the tax lot building, it received its initial certificate of occupancy on December 10, 2013.

Violations and lawsuits

According to city public data, the property has received $11,870 in OATH penalties in the last year.

There were no lawsuits or bankruptcies filed against the property for the past 24 months.

The neighborhood

In Midtown West, The majority, or 75 percent of the 75.9 million square feet of commercial built space are office buildings, with hotel buildings next occupying 14 percent of the space. In sales, Midtown West has the 2nd highest sale turnover among other neighborhoods in the city with $2.7 billion in sales volume in the last two years. For development, Midtown West is the most active neighborhood among other neighborhoods. It had 35.2 million square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 46 percent of the neighborhood’s built space.

The block

On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of five of the 11 commercial properties representing 1,041,390 square feet of the 1,327,970 square feet. The largest owner is Dream Hotel Group, followed by Madison Equities and then Riu Hotels & Resorts. On the tax block, there were three new building construction projects totaling 538,942 square feet. The largest is a 670-unit, 241,346 square-foot 70 building submitted by Extell Development and filed by David Rothstein with plans filed September 22, 2023 and permitted October 18, 2024. The second largest is a 512-unit, 185,296 square-foot 70 building submitted by Extell Development and filed by David Rothstein with plans filed September 22, 2023 and it has not been permitted yet.

The surrounding

Within a 400-foot radius of 239 West 54 Street, PincusCo identified eight commercial real estate items of interests occurred over the past 24 months. Of those eight items, one was for major renovation including a certificate of occupancy change. It was a permit application filed on March 26, 2025 for the $34.7 million renovation of 1,006,063-square-foot residential (R-2) building with 422 residential units at 1730 Broadway. Of those eight items, five were sales above $5 million totaling $395.4 million. The most recent of the five was Hiwin Group USA which bought the 4,190-square-foot, one-unit mixed-use building (K2) on 236 West 54th Street for $10.5 million from Moinian Group on October 10, 2024. Of those eight items, two were loans above $5 million totaling $188.1 million. The most recent of the two was David Mandelbaum and Michael Mandelbaum in which borrowed $52.5 million from Bank OZK secured by the 63,450-square-foot, eight-unit office building (O3) on 245 West 55th Street on July 24, 2024.

Direct link to the property’s ACRIS page and link to DOB NOW portal.