“You know who you should talk to about this?”
A phrase uttered too many times to count by real estate executives, suggesting Kathy Wylde as a source on industry turmoil, city politics and the myriad ways those two things intersect. At the Partnership for New York City, she advocated for pro-business policies and represented the interests of some of the biggest names in real estate.
Now, after more than two decades at the helm, Wylde is stepping down as CEO.
In 2020, Wylde told me her retirement plans were disrupted by the pandemic. Now they are back on track: She plans to step down in June 2026. In the meantime, she will help the Partnership find her replacement.
I spoke with Wylde Thursday about the potential future role of the Partnership in driving more housing construction in the city as federal cuts loom, attitudes toward the real estate industry and what lies ahead for her successor.
You have been involved in talks to save New York’s congestion pricing program. Is there another real estate-related policy disaster or success that you were involved with during your career that sticks out in your mind?
In the ‘80s, housing programs [created alongside Mayor Ed Koch and Gov. Andrew Cuomo] really drove the restoration of real estate values in neighborhoods. The banks took real risks on investing literally to create value, rather than take advantage of it. We had the advantage of having a huge inventory of vacant land and buildings in public ownership or bank foreclosure.
We also had a much less heavy-handed bureaucracy. Because government was broke — government was preoccupied with managing basic services — intermediary organizations like the Community Preservation Corporation, the Partnership, Enterprise and LISC basically did a lot of the work that subsequently government has taken over. Frankly, we were much less bureaucratic and more efficient.
Sounds like you think the government could take a lesson from that period.
Yes, particularly as we face the potential federal cuts and challenges to the city and state budget, we should be revisiting those models.
Does that kind of change have to be motivated by a crisis?
Nobody gives up power willingly. Certainly not government. A crisis is a terrible thing to waste. [She was referring to a quote often attributed to Rahm Emanuel, former chief of staff to Barack Obama.]
In your time at the partnership, do you feel like attitudes toward real estate have changed?
There was always room to build positive partnerships between local real estate interests and communities. It’s very hard to demonize your neighbors. There was as much fear of gentrification in the ‘70s and ‘80s as there is today. That has not changed.
Fear of gentrification and displacement is the same, but communities had local development corporations and local real estate developers. They had a different relationship than somebody coming in from the outside to build a big project. If you had an empty lot in your neighborhood, if you had vacant buildings that were burning, you welcomed redevelopment. Everybody’s always been scared of big development coming in, but when you worked at the community level and worked with local community development corporations, things went much more smoothly.
Do you think we’d see less opposition to housing projects?
I think the loss of a strong community development infrastructure in neighborhoods across the city has meant that communities respond negatively to development. Bringing back the network of strong community development corporations, you’ve got some that are still out there, like Fifth Avenue Committee in Brooklyn, that’s the model that we have to go back to, especially if we don’t have as much in terms of federal support for affordable housing.
What are the biggest real estate issues that you’ll be dealing with over the next year, and that your successor, whoever that may be, will be focused on beyond that?
In the short term, we’d love to see the state pass the Faith-Based Affordable Housing legislation, which would allow religious organizations to partner with private local developers to get some housing built. In general, I think the most important thing in the next year is to look at what is driving the cost of housing construction, just as we did with City of Yes, then design new programs that will work in every community and don’t require three quarters of the units to be luxury, market rate housing to cross subsidize the lower income units. We certainly need ownership programs. Keeping middle-income people in the city is going to require offering them the security of ownership.
What are you looking most forward to in your retirement?
Well, I’m not retiring for a year, so I really don’t have a plan. I’m retiring in June of next year, so I still have time to drive people crazy.
What we’re thinking about: Who do you think should replace Wylde at the Partnership? Send a note to kathryn@therealdeal.com.
A thing we’ve learned: The City Council has bucked the tradition of member deference when voting on Uniform Land Use Review Procedure actions 12 times since 2000, according to a report by the Charter Revision Commission. Most were nonresidential projects.
Elsewhere in New York…
— Meera Joshi, one of the deputy mayors who quit over Adams’ cooperation with the Trump administration, is now president of Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, the New York Times reports. “What may not be obvious at first when you think about Green-Wood,” she told the Times, “is there are an incredible number of parallels to running the city’s operations, albeit on a smaller scale.”
— State lawmakers were still negotiating a late state budget on May 4, better known as Star Wars Day. Two weeks later, the Senate approved a resolution officially recognizing Star Wars Day and celebrated the occasion with lightsabers and stormtroopers, City & State reports.
Closing Time
Residential: The priciest residential sale Thursday was $13.75 million for a 4,382-square-foot condominium unit at 737 Park Avenue in Lenox Hill. Arvik Group Real Estate had the listing.
Commercial: The most expensive commercial closing of the day was a portfolio of 11 rental properties totalling $68 million. The Real Deal’s Suzannah Cavanaugh covered the story on Related’s sale to PH Realty and Rockledge on Tuesday. The properties closed today combined for 715 units.
New to the Market: The highest price for a residential property hitting the market was $5.75 million for a 2,361-square-foot condominium at 11 Beach Street in Tribeca. The Eklund Gomes Team at Douglas Elliman has the listing.
Breaking Ground: The largest new building application filed was for a 54,782-square-foot, 11-story, 55-unit residential building at 38-20 22nd Street in Long Island City. Gerald Caliendo filed the permit on behalf of Robert Cerrone of Parksite Construction.
— Matthew Elo