Prominent Big Apple developer Michael Shvo has been hit with a lawsuit from a disgruntled couple who plunked down $6.1 million for a pad at the Mandarin Oriental Fifth Avenue, claiming the luxury building is riddled with problems — including a pool in “algae infested” roof.
John Goodman and his wife, Diane Johnson, claimed that the Shvo-developed building at 685 Fifth Ave. is “scarred by construction defects, unfinished fixtures, a pervasive sense of neglect and compromised services that in no way meet Mandarin Oriental’s five-star standards and the defendants’ noise,” according to a complaint filed in the Supreme Court of New York in Manhattan on Monday.
The couple filed a separate lawsuit against Shvo late last year after paying a record sum for their one-bedroom apartment, demanding that he fix up their unfinished unit, The Post reported.
The new complaint, which also names the Mandarin Oriental Group and Shvo’s foreign investors, now seeks to withdraw their money so they can escape the money pit.
The couple, who go by Goodmans, said their 18th-floor unit “is now effectively worthless. Their dreams have been shattered, leaving them with a significant financial loss and a deep sense of betrayal”. the lawsuit says.
The buzzy building, where another buyer paid a record $3.88 million in cash last December for a small studio, is a shambles, the complaint added.
The lawsuit alleges that the “rooftop oasis turned into a wasteland of dead leaves and an algae-infested pool that remained open despite posing a health hazard to residents.”
Goodmans also claimed that the building is a “virtual ghost town” and claimed that only 16 of the 64 units have been sold after three years.
It says: “Shvo, having taken out his profits, has effectively abandoned the building, leaving behind a financial and reputational wreckage. The sponsor, controlled by Shvo, is facing imminent default” and that they are “trapped in a desert environment”.
It’s so bad that the promised Michelin-starred private restaurant, Daniel Boulud, now closes at 5pm every day, “eliminating the opportunity to enjoy a key incentive amenity and advertised dining experience”.
The complaint accuses Shvo of orchestrating a “brazen scheme … to defraud buyers.”
The allegations echo complaints made against Shvo by the owners of the luxury members-only Core Club, which filed a $600 million lawsuit against the developer earlier this month.
According to the Goodmans’ lawsuit, Shvo fed them a “seductive illusion of luxury and exclusivity.”
But instead of living the dream, they are in a living nightmare.
Residents paying millions of dollars walk by dead plants and worse.
“The grand entrance, envisioned as a welcoming gateway, remains an unfinished facade (a temporary covering of semi-unpainted plywood that should have been bronze), a haunting visual reminder of the project’s stalled progress and lack of care”, the complaint states.
Shvo’s lawyer rejected the latest accusations.
“This is a disgruntled buyer who has decided to declare war … and spends his days looking for dead flowers,” attorney Morris Missry of the Wachtel firm Missry LLP told The Post.
The Goodmans’ December lawsuit claimed their treasured home was filled with warped millwork, rippling wallpaper, missing doors, no heat in radiant floors, wrong-sized pieces of furniture and missing pieces of furniture. turnkeys that were promised – like desks.
Shvo’s lawyer previously told The Post that the lawsuit was “a brazen attempt to use the courts and the press to extort money.”
At the same time, Page Six reported that Shvo uses the building as his “personal fiefdom with blatant disregard, hosting disruptive events, monopolizing common areas, accommodating guests in turnkey residences and violating building rules without being punished”.
Shvo is also being sued by former business partner Serdar Bilgili for fraud and unjust enrichment in an unrelated case at the Crown Building, 730 Fifth Avenue.
In 2018, Shvo pleaded guilty to tax evasion and paid $3.5 million in back taxes and penalties.
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