Trump Never Give Up

SoHo has been a chic neighborhood for some years now, and I waited a long time to enter it as a developer. I knew it’d be a fight to get anything going there because most of SoHo is made up of low-rise buildings and is subject to strict zoning laws. I doubt if any of you would think of or refer to SoHo as a manufacturing center, but for historical reasons, that’s how much of it is zoned. So, building a residential structure in the locations I wanted is not permitted. However, you can build a hotel there. When I learned that, I decided to build a condominium hotel in SoHo—a tall one.

SoHo is considered a mecca for art, film, and fashion buffs, with over 250 art galleries, 100 designer stores, and over 200 restaurants. In other words, it’s a great area to visit and an even greater area to stay. I believed SoHo deserved—and was ready for—a first-rate, twenty-first-century hotel.

The 45-story, $450 million tower I hoped to build with my partners, Bayrock Group and the Sapir Organization, was, of course, met with a fury of opposition from local community activists and the politicians that represent them. I wouldn’t let that stop us. I announced my intention on June 6, 2006, on The Apprentice. Despite everything that ensued, on May 8, 2007, I’m pleased to report, we were approved by city officials to erect this condo hotel. Along the way, we had a few problems to deal with, which was not a huge surprise.

The biggest obstacle was the height of the building. SoHo is a low-rise neighborhood, and this project would significantly alter the skyline. It would be the tallest building between midtown and the financial district. It’s not that SoHo isn’t zoned for tall buildings—it is—but none have ever been built. We wanted to change that. There were “air rights” laws—the right to build higher—already in place that made it perfectly legal to build a high-rise. In fact, we added several floors to the hotel’s design by buying the air rights from the neighboring properties.

Although we had the right to build a hotel with the height we wanted, the fact that no one had done it before worked against us. This project was the first time New York City’s Department of Buildings had to consider a condominium hotel in one of New York City’s manufacturing districts, which do not permit residential use. The City’s antiquated zoning laws and the local residents, together, created formidable obstacles.

New York City (unlike many other major U.S. destination cities) had never before been confronted with a hotel comprised entirely of condominiums. The key zoning consideration for the City was that the units would not be residences for the owners, but would be for transient occupancy. That meant we had to prove to the Department of Buildings that Trump SoHo would not be a residential building, but a building for short-term stays—and I firmly believed we could convince the City officials of this.

A condo hotel is not an apartment. It operates on the premise that the buyers have the right to use their condo units for only a certain number of days each year, and when an owner is not occupying their condo hotel unit the units get rented out as hotel rooms. It’s a great setup because both the owner and the management company collect revenues. The units in Trump SoHo are not designed for permanent residences, nor would an owner use his or her unit that way (the look, feel, and design of a luxury hotel is far, far different than that of a residential building). We worked tirelessly with the City to make our intentions clear.

As expected, everyone and their cousin came after me for this, and the Greenwich Village Society for Historical Preservation called my plan a “Trojan horse” way to sneak condos into manufacturing districts across the City. They said my motives were entirely covert. How a 45-story building can be considered a covert operation is beyond me, but you get the idea. There were demonstrations and neighborhood alliances that made it clear that I would not be receiving a warm welcome. So what else is new? Meanwhile, the silent majority of the neighborhood actually supported the project and saw it for what it is: a major attraction for tourism and business. The project will significantly improve a neighborhood that had been artificially suppressed for years as a result of its antiquated manufacturing zoning.

Despite the very vocal minority, I wasn’t about to be slowed down. We started excavation in 2006 even though we had not yet received approval to build above ground.

In December, the excavating contractors came across some human remains that were later determined to be about a century old. We immediately and voluntarily halted work. The police arrived, and the city ordered us to stop work on the lot altogether. This may not have been legal, but we agreed. We then hired a team of archeologists to excavate and identify the remains. At this point, what we didn’t need was more publicity while waiting for approval, but of course it made the news, and one director of a city preservation society quipped that we should rename the project Trump Condo Hotel & Mausoleum. It’s always something, isn’t it? In the end and despite all of the hoopla in the press, by attacking the skeleton problem immediately and in force we were able to get back to work within a week.

Then the bloggers got going on the subject of the hotel and the discovery, and it was a big topic for a while. We were also getting many letters from citizens and societies opposing our constructing the building. There were demonstrations at the site, and the controversy went on for close to a year. Additionally, we were accused of building a 45-story target for a terrorist attack, and there was an online cartoon that had a skeleton with a comb-over as an advertisement for the new building. One thing for certain is that all of New York and all New Yorkers knew I was building a new building. Someone once said I was a great promoter, but sometimes I don’t have to do a thing to get attention.

The hits kept coming, and it felt like being in the eye of the hurricane, but it made us solid and stronger in our mission. At one point, someone got hold of some of our early drafts of marketing materials mentioning that the units would be a great residential opportunity—which created a political and activist firestorm. However, we stayed focused on what we wanted: to get approval. We knew we couldn’t change the zoning nor could we build under the existing zoning if the building was characterized as residential. So we were very focused on proving to the City that the building was not residential and that we could proceed within the existing zoning laws.

We showed the City that we had specific constraints regarding occupancy that were very clear. My team ended up negotiating with the City for months over a six-page “Restrictive Declaration,” which included many hour-long sessions where the City officials would analyze and critique every comma in that document (literally). We were airtight and transparent in what was being offered. Our condo plan published everything in black and white. Nothing was hidden. As a result, we finally got approval—our proposed building was absolutely within the zoning laws of SoHo, and no one could argue otherwise. My father had always said, “Know everything you can about what you’re doing,” and that’s the advice I followed. Every adversity served as fuel in what had become a fight of city-sized proportions.

As of today, the Trump SoHo project is going along beautifully. Both Don Jr. and Ivanka are working on it with me and my partners, as did Sean Yazbeck, The Apprentice season five winner, and Julius Schwarz of Bayrock.

It’s going to be a wonderful, elegant, and tasteful addition to the SoHo neighborhood. There will be 25,000 square feet of commercial space that will include a top-notch restaurant, a 7,500-square-foot spa, and a 12,000-square-foot conference center, and there will be 360-degree views from the 12th floor up. We’ll have a stunning year-round pool with full-service private cabanas, a private library, a café, bar, and restaurant, and I can guarantee you that my SoHo neighbors are going to love it—eventually. It will enhance their property value, for one thing, because it’s going to be a beauty. Be sure to visit the famous manufacturing district of SoHo when you come to New York and take a look.

SoHo caused perhaps a few more problems than expected, but it was all in a year’s work—to us. That’s big city business and we are big enough to handle it. Be sure you have the same attitude—it will save you a lot of unnecessary anxiety.

COACH TRUMP

MAKE IT HAPPEN IN YOUR LIFE

Adversity is a fact of life. Chances are that you will never wake up to an adversity-free day. Accept this as a challenge—rather than a disappointment. Be bigger than the problems, be ready to fight for your rights, and all will be well.