ML-Implode News - At Kushners' Manhattan Tower, Debt Payments and Losses Increase

At 666 Fifth Ave., losses totaled $14.5 million after accounting for loan payments, from about $10 million in 2015, figures filed by LNR Partners show. Net operating income for the period grew 2.7 percent from the prior year to $41.3 million, while debt payments rose 11 percent to $55.8 million. Occupancy at the tower jumped to 80 percent at the end of 2016, a gain from 70 percent in September, the documents show....
[Jared] Kushner has divested his interest in the tower to family to prevent conflicts of interest with his government role. His father, Charles Kushner, has searched for partners to convert it into a luxury residential property. China's Anbang Insurance Group Co. had been in advanced talks to team up on a redevelopment of the building. Those discussions ended in late March.

...Repayment terms for more than $1.2 billion of debt on the Midtown property are growing more punitive as a 2019 due date draws near, Bloomberg reported last month. Kushner, now a senior adviser to the president, broke price records when he purchased 666 Fifth for his family firm, Kushner Cos., in 2007.

This article has more on the discussions with the Chinese company breaking off; an excerpt:

A deal with the Chinese company, the Anbang Insurance Group, which has ties to the highest echelons of the Chinese Communist Party, would have bound together two politically connected companies. It had become the subject of enormous media attention and had drawn scrutiny from Democratic lawmakers in Washington.

The speculation surrounding the deal became a distraction that led both companies to abandon the negotiations, according to a spokesman for Kushner Companies.

How could they even think that was "OK" to try in the first place??

Relevant:

At Kushners' Manhattan Tower, Debt Payments and Losses Increase