Trump Tower in Toronto Is Bankrupt
Trump Tower in Toronto Is Bankrupt (from electoral-vote.com)
The 65-story luxurious Trump Tower in Toronto filed for bankruptcy on Tuesday. Trump has been involved in the project since the beginning and his name is prominently displayed on it, but he is not an investor. The actual developer is a Russian-born billionaire, Alex Schnaider. Despite Trump's involvement and name, the project has been a disaster from the beginning. Hotel occupancy rates were expected to be 55% in the worst-case scenario, but in reality they have been 15% to 45%, so management has had to lower the room rate by $100, and the hotel is still being outcompeted by the Four Seasons and Ritz Carlton. Many of the condos are unsold. Buyers were told that the Trump name would make it easy to get mortgages, but the banks were unimpressed and many people lost money. Lawsuits abound. All in all, this failure raises the question of his business judgment. He claims that he licenses his name only to top-flight ventures that he has carefully vetted, but this high-profile failure suggests that either he isn't careful at all about who gets to use his name, or his ability to vet business partners is not very good. (V)
Full story:
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/11/trump-tower-goes-bust-canada-214412