‘Trump Place’ sign to be removed from New York building after property ‘decreases in value’

Buildings with Trump sign once commanded premium over other Manhattan buildings but now sell for below average, according to research firm CityRealty

The residents of 120 Riverside Boulevard have voted to remove ‘Trump Place’ sign over their front door after five other buildings in Upper West Side area of New York took down signs with president’s name (Google )

A "Trump Place" sign is to come down from a New York building's facade for the second time in four months, after condominium owners at 120 Riverside Boulevard voted to have the name removed.

The building's condominium board announced the decision on Thursday, according to an email to building owners obtained by The Washington Post. The email said that, after a vote of the building's condo owners, the tally was about 55 per cent in favour of removing the large sign over their front door.

"Accordingly, arrangements are being made to have the 'Trump Place' signage removed from the building façade," the email said. It was not clear when the sign would actually come down.

The decision follows a similar one by condominium owners at 200 Riverside Boulevard, a few blocks north, in October.

Both buildings sit on the former site of a rail yard on the Upper West Side that Donald Trump helped develop in the 1990s. The area was named Trump Place in his honour, and six buildings once bore signs with that name.

Since election day 2016, the owners of five buildings have decided to remove it – a stark demonstration of Mr Trump's unpopularity in the city that gave him his start, and which he still calls home.

Equity Residential, an apartment company that owns three nearby buildings, took down Mr Trump's name just after the election. Then the condo owners at 200 Riverside – facing legal warnings from the Trump Organisation – went to court, and persuaded a state judge to rule that the Trump Organisation could not stop them from removing their own signs.

The loss of the Trump name at 120 Riverside will not cost Mr Trump's company any revenue. The company does not manage the building or derive any ongoing licensing revenue from its use of the Trump name.

The Trump Organisation did not immediately respond to a request for comment sent on Thursday afternoon.

Mr Trump still owns his businesses, although he has shifted day-to-day control to his eldest sons, Donald Trump Jr and Eric Trump. Since Mr Trump's election, his political career has alienated some of his old customers in left-leaning big cities and foreign countries.

In that time, the small Trump hotel empire has become smaller: Trump hotels in Panama City, Toronto and New York's SoHo neighbourhood have removed the president's name.

The company had planned to expand into dozens of US cities with new lines of lower-cost hotels. But last week, Eric Trump announced he was shelving that plan, saying politically driven criticism and media scrutiny had made it impossible.

In Manhattan, Mr Trump's name now adorns 11 condo buildings. The research firm CityRealty found that the price of condos in those buildings – measured in dollars per square foot – began to decrease in 2016, and continued to drop in 2018.

Using that metric, Trump buildings once commanded a premium above other Manhattan buildings, but now the price per square foot that units in Trump buildings sell for is below average.

"Trump buildings have not performed as well as the rest of the market over the past 18 months," said Daniel Levy, CityRealty president.

Mr Levy said that it's difficult to determine the exact cause of the price depreciation but that "the data certainly suggests kind of a negative correlation between [the prices] and the presidency since he took office."

Now, the last building with a "Trump Place" sign will be the one at 220 Riverside. In 2016, that building's board rejected a name change, citing the potential for litigation and the cost of removing the sign, according to the Los Angeles Times.

The board at 220 Riverside did not immediately return a calls for comment on Thursday.

Washington Post