Business career of Donald Trump

Donald Trump is an American businessman and television personality who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021. He began his real estate career at his father's company, Trump Management, which he later renamed the Trump Organization. He rose to public prominence after concluding a number of highly publicized real estate deals in Manhattan, and his company now owns and licenses his name to lodging and golf courses around the world. Trump partly or completely owned several beauty pageants between 1996 and 2015. He has marketed his name to many building projects and commercial products. Trump's unsuccessful business ventures have included numerous casinos and hotel bankruptcies, the folding of his New Jersey Generals football team, and the now-defunct Trump University.

After being inaugurated as U.S. president in January 2017, Trump resigned all management roles within the Trump Organization, and delegated company management to his sons Donald Jr. and Eric. However, Trump retained his financial stake in the work document, leaving ongoing concerns about possible conflicts of interest.

Real estate

Early career

Trump began his real estate career at his father's company, Trump Management, which focused on middle-class rental housing in the New York City boroughs of Brooklyn, Queens, and Staten Island. One of Trump's first projects was the attempted turnaround of the troubled Swifton Village apartment complex in Cincinnati, Ohio, which his father, Fred Trump, had purchased at foreclosure for $5.7 million in 1962, equivalent to $46 million in 2017. Fred and Donald Trump became involved in the project. By the time Trump graduated from college in 1968, he was receiving the 2019 equivalent of $1,000,000 a year in untaxed gifts from his father. At age 23, he made an unsuccessful commercial foray into show business, investing $70,000 to become co-producer of the 1970 Broadway comedy '' Paris Is Out!''

He was made the president of the company in 1971 and began using "The Trump Organization" as an umbrella brand. In that year, at the age of 25, he also moved to Manhattan, where he took part in larger construction projects and used glitzy architectural design to foster media attention. In 1973, the Justice Department alleged that the Trump Organization discriminated against prospective black tenants, rather than just screening out low-income applicants as they said. The Department of Justice said that black "testers" were sent to more than half a dozen buildings and were denied apartments, but a similar white tester would then be offered an apartment in the same building. Ultimately the Trumps' company and federal officials signed an agreement under which the Trumps made no admission of wrongdoing, and under which qualified minority applicants would be presented by the Urban League.

By 1973, Trump as president of the Trump Organization oversaw 14,000 apartments across Brooklyn, Queens, and Staten Island. In 1978, the city selected his site on the West Side of Manhattan as the location for its Jacob Javits Convention Center, after finding that he was the only bidder who had a site ready for the project. He received a broker's fee on the property sale.

Trump's first major deal in Manhattan was the development of the Grand Hyatt Hotel in 1978 next to Grand Central Terminal. The aging brick facade of the Commodore Hotel was sheathed in glass, and the existing lobby of the hotel was replaced by an atrium. The Commodore was thus presented as a remodeled Hyatt hotel at its opening in September 1980, helping to bring Trump to public prominence. Part of this deal was a $1 million loan Fred Trump's Village Construction Corp. made to help repay draws on a Chase Manhattan credit line Fred had arranged for Donald as he built the hotel, as well as a $70 million construction loan jointly guaranteed by Fred and the Hyatt hotel chain. Fred was a silent partner in the initiative, due to his reputation having been damaged in New York real estate circles, after investigations into windfall profits and other abuses in his real estate projects, making Donald the frontman in the deal. According to journalist Wayne Barrett, Fred's two-decade friendship with a top Equitable officer, Ben Holloway, helped convince them to agree to the project. Donald negotiated a 40-year tax abatement for the hotel with the city, in exchange for a share of the venture's profits. The deal helped reduce the risk of the project and provided an incentive for investors to participate.

In 1981, Trump purchased and renovated a building that would become the Trump Plaza, on Third Avenue in New York City. Trump made this into an apartment cooperative, in which tenants partly owned the building.

Trump Tower

In 1983, Trump completed development of Trump Tower, a 58-story skyscraper in Midtown Manhattan. The project involved complicated negotiations with different parties for the Bonwit Teller building, the land, and the airspace above a neighboring building. When negotiations were completed in 1978, ''The New York Times'' wrote "That Mr. Trump was able to obtain the location ... is testimony to ispersistence and to his skills as a negotiator."

Trump Tower occupies the former site of the architecturally significant Bonwit Teller flagship store, which Trump demolished in 1980 after purchasing the site. There was public outrage when valuable Art Deco bas-relief sculptures on its facade, which had been promised to the Metropolitan Museum of Art by Trump, were destroyed on the orders of the Trump Organization during the demolition process. In addition, the demolition of the Bonwit Teller store was criticized for a contractor's use of some 200 illegal Polish immigrant workers, who, during the rushed demolition process, were reportedly paid 4–5 dollars per hour for work in 12-hour shifts. Trump testified in 1990 that he rarely visited the site and was unaware of the illegal workers, some of whom lived at the site and who were known as the "Polish Brigade". A judge ruled in 1991 that the builders engaged in "a conspiracy to deprive the funds of their rightful contribution", referring to the pension and welfare funds of the labor unions. However, on appeal, parts of that ruling were overturned, and the record became sealed when the long-running labor lawsuit was settled in 1999, after 16 years in court.

Trump Tower was developed by Trump and the Equitable Life Assurance Company, and was designed by architect Der Scutt of Swanke Hayden Connell. Trump Tower houses both the primary penthouse condominium residence of Donald Trump and the headquarters of the Trump Organization. The building includes shops, cafés, offices, and residences. Its five-level atrium features a 60-foot-high waterfall spanned by a suspended walkway, below a skylight. Trump Tower was the setting of the NBC television show ''The Apprentice'' including a fully functional television studio set. When the building was completed, its condominiums sold quickly and the tower became a tourist attraction.

Expansion

Harrah's at Trump Plaza opened in Atlantic City in 1984. The hotel/casino was built by Trump with financing by Holiday Corp. and operated by the Harrah's gambling unit of Holiday Corp. The casino's poor results exacerbated disagreements between Trump and Holiday Corp. Trump also acquired a partially completed building in Atlantic City from the Hilton Corporation for $320 million. When completed in 1985, the hotel/casino became Trump Castle. Trump's wife, Ivana, managed the property.

Trump acquired the Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, in 1985 for $5 million, plus $3 million for the home's furnishings. In addition to using the home as a winter retreat, Trump also turned it into a private club with membership fees of $150,000. At about the same time, he acquired a condominium complex in West Palm Beach with Lee Iacocca that became Trump Plaza of the Palm Beaches.

In 1980, repairs began on Central Park's Wollman Rink, with an anticipated two-and-a-half year construction time frame. Because of flaws in the design and numerous problems during construction, the project remained unfinished by May 1986 and was estimated to require another 18 months and $2 million to $3 million to complete. Trump was awarded a contract as the general contractor in June 1986 to finish the repairs by December 15 with a cost ceiling of $3 million, with the actual costs to be reimbursed by the city. Trump hired an architect, a construction company, and a Canadian ice-rink manufacturer and completed the work in four months, $775,000 under budget. He operated the rink for a year and gave some of the profits to charity and public works projects in exchange for the rink's concession rights. Trump managed the rink from 1987 to 1995. He received another contract in 2001 which was extended until 2021. According to journalist Joyce Purnick, Trump's "Wollman success was also the stuff of a carefully crafted, self-promotional legend." While the work was in progress, Trump called numerous press conferences, for example for the completion of the laying of the pipes and the pouring of the cement. In 1987, he also unsuccessfully tried to get the city to rename the landmark after him; the Trump logo is prominently displayed on the railing encircling the rink, on the Zamboni, on the rental skates, and on the rink's website.

Trump unveiled a plan to construct a miniature city within New York City on the "largest available undeveloped tract" of land on the island of Manhattan on November 30, 1984. The Television City proposal, later called Trump City, would consist of "nearly 8,000 apartments and condominiums for up to 20,000 people, almost 10,000 parking spots, some 3.6 million square feet of television and movie studio space, and some 2 million square feet of 'prestigious' stores." To stand above all other buildings would have been an uncommonly tall skyscraper for the time, to be twice the height of the 76-story buildings beneath it. An organization of celebrities called Westpride, consisting of such individuals as Jerry Seinfeld, Christopher Reeve, and others, was formed and fundraised in opposition to the proposal. Mayor Ed Koch denied Trump tax breaks to help him develop his proposal, instead giving them to NBC to thwart the possibility of them relocating from Rockefeller Center to Trump's concept.

Trump acquired the Plaza Hotel in Manhattan in 1988. He paid $400 million for the property and once again tapped Ivana to manage its operation and renovation.

Later in 1988, Trump acquired the Taj Mahal Casino in Atlantic City, New Jersey, in a transaction with Merv Griffin and Resorts International. The casino was opened in April 1990, and was built at a total cost of $1.1 billion, which at the time made it the most expensive casino ever built. Financed with $675 million in junk bonds at a 14% interest rate, the project entered Chapter 11 bankruptcy the following year. Banks and bondholders, facing potential losses of hundreds of millions of dollars, opted to restructure the debt. In late 1990, Trump and Westpride negotiated an alternative proposal to scrap Trump's original concept for Trump City and instead build Riverside South, devoid of Trump's tall skyscraper and instead consisting of a park and shorter buildings than the originally proposed 76-story ones. Architecture critic Paul Goldberger wrote for ''The New York Times'' in August 1991, "Mr. Trump knew that it would be a freezing day in August before his own plan could ever win approval and, like any skillful politician, he jumped on the opposition bandwagon so deftly that he made it look like his own."

The Taj Mahal emerged from bankruptcy on October 5, 1991, with Trump ceding 50% ownership in the casino to the bondholders in exchange for lowered interest rates and more time to pay off the debt. He also sold his financially challenged Trump Shuttle airline and his 282-foot (86 m) megayacht, the ''Trump Princess''. Trump would gain the financial backing for Riverside South from Hong Kong-based businessmen for around $90 million, which would help pay for dues on the property Trump owed to banks and on back taxes, with Trump collecting a 30% ownership stake and maintaining daily construction. According to a lawyer close to the negotiations, the agreement almost fell apart after Trump "used a string of foul language, including racial epithets regarding Asians" during the negotiations. The agreement helped Trump avoid personal bankruptcy after having to file for corporate bankruptcy four times prior.

The Taj Mahal property was repurchased in 1996 and consolidated into Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts, which filed for bankruptcy in 2004 with $1.8 billion in debt, filing again for bankruptcy five years later with $50 million in assets and $500 million in debt. The restructuring ultimately left Trump with 10% ownership in the Trump Taj Mahal and other Trump casino properties. Trump served as chairman of the organization, which was renamed Trump Entertainment Resorts, from mid-1995 until early 2009, and served as CEO from mid-2000 to mid-2005.

Business bankruptcies

Although Trump has never filed for personal bankruptcy, hotels and casino businesses of his have declared bankruptcy six times between 1991 and 2009 due to its inability to meet required payments and to re-negotiate debt with banks, owners of stock and bonds and various small businesses (unsecured creditors). Because the businesses used Chapter 11 bankruptcy, they were allowed to operate while negotiations proceeded. Trump was quoted by ''Newsweek'' in 2011 saying, "I do play with the bankruptcy laws—they're very good for me."

The six bankruptcies were the result of over-leveraged hotel and casino businesses in Atlantic City and New York: Trump Taj Mahal (1991), Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino (1992), Plaza Hotel (1992), Trump Castle Hotel and Casino (1992), Trump Hotels and Casino Resorts (2004), and Trump Entertainment Resorts (2009). Trump said "I've used the laws of this country to pare debt. ... We'll have the company. We'll throw it into a chapter. We'll negotiate with the banks. We'll make a fantastic deal. You know, it's like on ''The Apprentice''. It's not personal. It's just business."

Inheritance and further acquisitions

In 1996, Trump acquired a vacant, 70-story office building at 40 Wall Street in Manhattan, renovated it, and branded it as ''The Trump Building''. In 1998, Conseco and Trump purchased the General Motors Building for $878 million from Corporate Property Investors. The group received a $700 million loan from Lehman Brothers for the purchase and Trump reportedly only committed $15 to $20 million of his own money to the deal. Trump raised the controversial sunken plaza where few pedestrians had ventured, which had been criticized by Huxtable, and installed his name in four-foot gold letters. In 2003, Trump and partners sold the building for $1.4 billion, then the highest price paid for a North American office building, to Macklowe Organization.

After his father died in 1999, Trump and his siblings received equal portions of his father's estate valued at $250–300 million.

In 2001, Trump completed Trump World Tower, a 72-story residential tower across from the United Nations Headquarters. Trump also began construction on Riverside South, which he dubbed Trump Place, a multi-building development along the Hudson River. He continued to own commercial space in Trump International Hotel and Tower, a 44-story mixed-use (hotel and condominium) tower on Columbus Circle which he acquired in 1996, and also continued to own millions of square feet of other prime Manhattan real estate.

Trump acquired the former Hotel Delmonico in Manhattan in 2002. It was re-opened with 35 stories of luxury condominiums in 2004 as the Trump Park Avenue.

Trump has owned a house on North Rodeo Drive in the Beverly Hills, California/Los Angeles area, bought for $7 million, since 2007. He bought a home next door in 2008 from Omar Bongo, the president of Gabon who would die in office in 2009, for $10.35 million. Trump sold the second LA home, built in 1981, for $9,500,095 in 2009 for an $850,000 (8%) loss. The second house went back on the market in mid-2016 listed at nearly $30 million.

Trump has licensed his name and image for the development of a number of real estate projects including two Trump-branded real estate projects in Florida that have gone into foreclosure. The Turkish owner of Trump Towers Istanbul, who pays Trump for the use of his name, was reported in December 2015 to be exploring legal means to dissociate the property after the candidate's call to temporarily ban Muslims from entering the United States.

Trump also licensed his name to son-in-law Jared Kushner's 50-story Trump Bay Street, a Jersey City

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