Manhattan Club Lawsuit

Maybe we should form a TMC Owners Association so that we have a collective voice. If there are enough interested members, we can request TMC for the list of owners and their contact info. TMC cannot deny its owners to form a users' association.

Great idea there's power in numbers and we need to try to move this along to some conclusion, hopefully a positive for scammed owners.

kathleenb204 wrote:

Great idea there's power in numbers and we need to try to move this along to some conclusion, hopefully a positive for scammed owners.

kathleenb204,

please tell me how WE can "move this along to some conclusion" when the new york state attorney can't do so. you speak about "power in numbers".............true there are almost 14 to18,000 of us mc shareowners. however, last august there was a meeting of owners that was well-arranged and planned for.....................only about 100-150 of us owners showed up, and unfortunately, nothing, in my opinion, constructive came of this meeting. we were talked TO, but none of us really was able to speak out to contribute anything relating to a conclusion to this freaked-out situation we're in, concerning our interests in the mc.

please let us know how you plan to "move this along to some conclusion", and use the adage ""power in numbers". this means creative organization. how can we owners organize when we don't know who 95+% of the owners are so we can notify them.

i totally agree with the ideas of your post here at redweek.com, but we all need to construct a viable plan to come to a satisfactory conclusion concerning our unfortunate relationship with eichner and his gang.

Owners can sell or transfer ownership -- it's the developer who can't. But the various lawsuits and the AG allegations of fraud put a damper on individual sales. Who'd want to buy into this mess? That's why the "dark clouds" need to pass soon. I've had no problem renting my reservations -- have done it twice, once through eBay and once through Redweek. TMC is in high demand as rentals because it's ideally located and not much competition.

Sell it? We can't give these things away...

I've rented weeks at the Manhattan Club many times. Unfortunately, it is usually $200-500 less than what my maintenance fee is for the week. Have you found a better site than Redweek, which has probably 30-40 other weeks at the MC for rent also. I'm tired of supplementing someone else's vacation, so not to get stuck with the $3200 maintenance fee that I prepay.

Removed.

on the MC bill for maintenance fees, there is a separate line for REAL ESTATE TAX. it occurred to me that $3-400 PER WEEK OWNED for real estate tax seems rather steep, even for new york city. how can we determine if the tax levy amount is correct? hopefully one or more of us can answer this question in this redweek.com forum. if not, can anyone direct us to where we can find out if the tax amount per week is correctly figured?

using $300 per week in nys real estate tax, and multiplying by 52 weeks per year, this adds up to a whopping $15,600. this times about 14,000 or more weeks owned (14,000 owners owning only one week) do the math for the total real estate tax collected..........for one year per unit owned. am i being incorrect or over-overwhelmed? could it be that eichner's financial staff MADE AN ERROR? HMMMMMM, I WONDER.

am awaiting a reasonable explanation.

thanks and keep in touch.

chris

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Latest Legal Developments in the Manhattan Club Scam vs NYAG with commentary from a TMC owner who is also an expert in this area.

Apparently, the NYAG is once again seeking to take depositions of defendants/respondents. Defendants have asked the court to stop the depositions—same arguments as earlier made, except this time NYAG will waive negative inference from asserting the 5th amendment, thereby eliminating the whipsaw effect. You will recall that this issue was briefed back in December/January and there was supposed to be a hearing on it but NYAG backed off when TMC withdrew its motion. AG wanted to depose the defendants. TMC said if they were deposed they would have to take the 5th amendment (I refuse to answer on the grounds it may incriminate me in the criminal case)—that is how we first learned that there, indeed, was a criminal investigation. The effect of taking the 5th amendment can be used against TMC in the civil case to prove fraud. If TMC testifies in the civil case and does not assert the 5th, then that testimony can be used against them in the criminal case (hence the whipsaw). Courts will often stay a civil action so the criminal action can go forward and defendants are not prejudiced in the civil case by taking the 5th amendment in the criminal case. It is more fair. TMC has the better argument on that one. NYAG may be worried that the Judge will find they haven’t done enough discovery and the court may let the individual defendants out of the case. AG may also be worried that the judge will rule in TMC’s favor on the standard of care for the injunctive relief that was recently briefed and argued and that NYAG will face a long drawn out appeal before they can take any more discovery.

https://iapps.courts.state.ny.us/nyscef/ViewDocument?docIndex=AtsuSZ_PLUS_7HqT6rDUtAJZroQ%3D%3D

My Translation: It is going to be a real wait for this to play out.

I was wondering the same thing! It just seems like a ridiculous amount of money in taxes. The penthouses are more than $450 in taxes for a week! If these are the real taxes they should be grieved because they are ridiculous!

In one of the court hearing's the NY AG's office noted that TMC is in arrears on their tax payments to the State of New York.

Irene Smalls

What is important to note is that the NYAG at least in the court hearing I attended in March is also now going after the 20% off the top payment from all revenues the Eichners have been receiving for years. In response to owners not paying their maintenance fees TMC is raising maintenance fees to cover the shortfall. TMC is not touching the 6.5 million dollars in "management fees" the Eichners receive through their shell company, Urban Management. The Eichners receive their 6.5 million dollars no matter what happens with maintenance fee payments. Urban Management supposedly manages the managers who are on TMC payroll who actually run the Manhattan Club. Corrine Smith has been saying this for years. The NYAG at the March hearing asked this 6.5 million dollar management fee be held in escrow. The NYAG did not realize that Urban was a shell company at the start of this investigation. Urban Management had NO employees. The head of Urban Management, Scott Lager, was paid out of the Manhattan Club budget. Since this discovery from the NYAG's investigation the Eichners have now added some employees to Urban Management from other Eichner companies.

Irene Smalls

marianne_z wrote:

I was wondering the same thing! It just seems like a ridiculous amount of money in taxes. The penthouses are more than $450 in taxes for a week! If these are the real taxes they should be grieved because they are ridiculous!

marianne_z,

"If these are the real taxes they should be grieved because they are ridiculous!" the operative word from your reply is "iF". i wouldn't put anything past ian bruce eichner and his den of thieves. again, do the math: use $300 as a starting point, times 14,000 weeks owned: that's works out to "a lotta cabbage."

next step: how and where do we find out if we are being bilked (again) for overpayment our share of new york city/state real estate taxes? where does eichner come up with the tax amount?

Thank you Irene for your posts. They are informative and helpful. My only complaint, as I've stated elsewhere in this blog, is spiking maintenance fees. I've never had a problem booking and using (or renting) my days at TMC. I like it a lot and just wish there wasn't this legal cloud and financial mismanagement causing such blight on what otherwise is a great idea -- an urban timeshare.

The New York Attorney General kicked in the doors last August 2015. We were able to cancel our 2 contracts with an advocacy group. Saved us over $50K over the next 5 years. I would like to subscribe to this forum to be up to date on what's going on with Manhattan Club. They have been doing bad business since the early 2000's.

Cliff, how were you able to rent your weeks out? I had the worst time trying to rent our 2 weeks out every yr. Paid numerous companies to help, got nothing. I would like to communicate with you to see if maybe you could help us out vice versa. You can inbox me here or email winklysmith@gmail.com , I am desperate need to help. I could use a few pointers. Thank You

I used to own 3 weeks at the Manhattan Club, a junior suite, a 1bd/2ba and a penthouse. I've owned since 1996 and enjoy coming to New York, 2-3 times a year. As the maintenance fees got higher, it was less affordable to own and I could not come to NY from California as often, so I used red week to rent my junior suite and 1bd unit out. The fees continued to rise and I used to have to rent it out for $200-500 per week. I hated supplementing somebody else's vacation, but had no choice. I eventually was able to give back my junior suite and 1bd to Manatttan Club, after being on the wait list for years. I kept the penthouse, but it is now up to about $3400. per week. I try to use it every year, because there is nothing else out there worth trading it for and definetely nothing close to the maintenance costs I absorb. So, I either rent it at Red Week and lose $500 per week now, or just use it and know you are overpaying for it. Good luck my friend. My hope is to keep the Manhattan Club penthouse, but to get some relief in the fees we pay. We'll see.

I WOULD VERY MUCH LIKE TO KNOW WHAT YOU DID, AND WOULD APPRECIATE YOUR EMAIL. THANK YOU. HANK D