With Mayor Eric Adams out of the race, some in the real estate industry see a path to victory for Andrew Cuomo. Others think nothing has changed.
On Monday, an email urged recipients to donate to Cuomo. This was one day after the mayor dropped his re-election bid and was the final day of fundraising before the next deadline for campaigns to file their contributions received between Aug. 19 and Sept. 29.
“With Mayor Adams stepping out of the race, today marks a pivotal moment in the NYC mayoral election,” it stated. “Today is the day to support the Andrew Cuomo campaign so he can defend NYC against radical socialist policies.”
Jared Epstein, president of development firm Aurora Capital Associates, who sent the email, says the effort helped raise $80,000, potentially more than $500,000 with public matching funds (though that has yet to be determined).
Epstein thinks with Adams out, Cuomo can consolidate moderate voters. He acknowledged that some in the industry are not as optimistic.
“Some people talk like Mamdani’s inevitable, but New Yorkers don’t back inevitability, they back resilience,” he said in an email.
Meanwhile, one industry source told me that, absent Sliwa dropping out or an act of God, Mamdani is likely to be the next mayor. Believing he will likely be their next mayor, some in the industry have been focusing on ways to work with Mamdani.
A poll released this month (before Adams bowed out) found that 46 percent of likely voters intend to cast their ballot for Zohran Mamdani. The poll, by the New York Times and Siena University, showed Cuomo in second with 24, but those margins narrow if Sliwa drops out. If the general election ends up being a two-way contest between Mamdani and Cuomo, the former would take 48 percent of the vote and the latter 44 percent, according to the poll.
But Sliwa has maintained that he won’t quit the race.
Mamdani held a press conference on Tuesday outside 220 Central Park South — where the penthouse sold in 2025 for nearly $240 million — to criticize reports that Cuomo hit the phones after Adams dropped out of the race seeking donations ahead of the fundraising deadline.
“We know that what billionaires and C-suite executives are once again trying to buy their way out of is a city that working people can actually afford — a city where the concerns of those people will be at the forefront and at the heart of our politics,” Mamdani said in a statement.
The next set of campaign finance filings won’t show us how real estate donors reacted to the news of Adams dropping out of the race, but activity over the next couple of weeks could provide more insight into whether more folks are holding out hope for Cuomo or have made peace with a Mamdani administration.
What we’re thinking about: Will real estate try to appeal to the Trump administration on its decision to withhold billions of dollars from key NYC infrastructure projects? Will, say, the largest property owner in the Penn Station area make a call? Send a note to kathryn@therealdeal.com.
A thing we’ve learned: Casinos play a major role in the fifth season of the show “Only Murders in the Building.” For one, an illicit but grand casino is discovered in the subterranean levels of the fictional Arconia (the real-life Belnord) and figures into the aforementioned murders in the building. In the sixth episode, Oliver (Martin Short) and Loretta (Meryl Streep) are walking around Flatbush when they are asked by a man with a clipboard if they care about dogs dying. His mission isn’t canine rescue, though: He’s actually collecting signatures against opening a casino in New York City, noting that there are several competing bids.
Elsewhere in New York…
— The Trump administration announced Wednesday that it is withholding $18 billion in federal funding for two key infrastructure projects in New York, Politico New York reports. White House budget director Russell Vought said funding would be withheld from the Gateway Program, a new train tunnel under the Hudson River and the next phase of the Second Avenue subway, due to “unconstitutional DEI principles.” In a separate statement, the U.S. Department of Transportation indicated that funding for the projects was under review, to determine “whether any unconstitutional practices are occurring.” The statement noted that the shutdown of the federal government meant that the review would take more time.
— In his first public appearance since ending his reelection campaign, Mayor Eric Adams had a message for the next mayor: Don’t f-it up. “This city is in good shape, and we need to make sure we don’t go backwards,” he said on Wednesday, Gothamist reports. “And let me say in the words of Bloomberg when I became mayor, ‘Don’t f— it up.’”
— A NYCHA building in the Bronx partially collapsed on Wednesday after a gas explosion in the property’s chimney shaft, WABC reports. No injuries were reported, and city officials are investigating the cause of the explosion.
Closing Time
Residential: The top residential deal recorded Thursday was $26.5 million for a 9,652-square-foot single-family house at 11 West 12th Street in Greenwich Village.
Mark Fromm and Claudia Saez-Fromm with Douglas Elliman had the listing.
Commercial: The top commercial deal recorded was $7 million for a 12,295-square-foot commercial property at 1619 Broadway in Midtown.
New to the Market: The highest price for a residential property hitting the market was $32 million for a 4,028-square-foot condominium unit at 432 Park Avenue in Midtown East. Anne Prosser with Brown Harris Stevens has the listing.
Breaking Ground: The largest new building permit filed was for a proposed 47,984-square-foot, five-story school facility at 560 McDonald Avenue in Kensington. Lester Katz filed the permit on behalf of Jacob Bar Horin.
— Matthew Elo
