Despite beginning 2015 with a bang by announcing new leadership within the company, Speyer has had some tough times as well. The company is being passed from father leadership to son leadership. New York, REBNY, and Speyer employees are happy to see that the company will be within the same family and will likely have the same leadership and progression style. However, it is necessary to point out that Speyer’s road to success has had some tough times. Spewer fin and their partner, Blackcock Realty defaulted in 2010 on loans backing complexes on the Lower East side. Eventually, Speyer lost ownership of those buildings that they backed: Petter Cooper Village and Stuyvesant Town. The purchase was made in 2006. It had over 10,00 residential units available. The deal was made at the peak of the market place exchanges.
This was about a year before the housing bubble began to appear so Americans were extremely savvy about the real estate market, some claiming that it was the strongest it has ever been. They purchased it for $6.3 billion which was the largest real estate deal that had ever been made in the history of the United States, up to that point. However, reserve funds began to run out and Speyer realized that it the amount of debt they had racked up on the deal was becoming unrealistic to pay off. This resulted in a very complex and messy legal battle which was bad marketing for Speyer for the longest time. After the housing crash, Speyer began to manage their image and learnt from their mistakes.
