#silver investments Las Vegas

[iragoldproof]

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[simplegenius042]

Music Monday

Tagging @voidika @raresvtm @josephseedismyfather @noodlecupcakes @imogenkol @socially-awkward-skeleton @inafieldofdaisies @aceghosts @cloudofbutterflies92 @cassietrn @direwombat @adelaidedrubman @derelictheretic @davrinsgriffons @shallow-gravy @strangefable @statichvm @carlosoliveiraa @g0dspeeed @wrathfulrook @starsandskies @ladyoriza @la-grosse-patate @thewanderer-000 @omen-speaker @alypink @shellibisshe @josephslittledeputy @skoll-sun-eater @afarcryfrommymain @strafethesesinners @turbo-virgins @florbelles @minilev @justasmolbard @yokobai and @seedsplease + anyone else who'd like to join.

Next Hazbin Hotel songs for A Radioactive Calamity Of Love, Bombs & Gore, The UnTitledverse and The Silver Chronicles. You can listen below under the cut:

There's some slight changes I've made between Hazbin Hotel and my Smile Tunes WIP. Foremost is that I've added qualities I liked from the Pilot episode with some of the qualities we got from the official Season 1. This is gonna be more obviously seen with how Sir Pentious is treated; while compared to the rest of the Overlords of Hell, he is practically a wannabe and an annoyance, he is still pretty dangerous with the destruction he brings, especially with his past beef with Alastor (and current misgivings with Angel Dust). He acts as a reoccuring antagonist in the sense he keeps putting the hotel at constant threat of danger. However, when he's given the chance to join the hotel for redemption (by Charlie), he denies her request... at first. In fact, this would be the beginning of WIP's arc; trying to sell the fact that the Hotel is worth the investment to sinners, starting with Sir Pentious who keeps denying the offers again and again. Over time, Sir Pentious starts to wonder if being an Overlord is really worth it since he's getting nowhere with conquering turfs and his resources are getting lower. So when the Vees offer to fund him in exchange for pretending to be a attendant at the hotel, he agrees. Sir Pentious is pretty good at it... until he starts to have second thoughts, and even when he's discovered (which when he's caught he comes clean about his infiltration), unlike Vaggie and Angel, Charlie chooses forgiveness and compassion over animosity, since she does see that Sir Pentious does have regrets and also considers his desperate situation. In the WIP, "It Starts With Sorry" is probably going to be altered a bit since it's one of the more "meh" songs according to the fandom. Also side note! Sir Pentious is still going to be his doofus self, he's just got enough braincells to still be conniving. You can listen to the song below:

"It starts with "sorry" That's your foot in the door, one simple "sorry" Spoken straight from your core The path to forgiveness is a twisting trail of hearts But "sorry" is where it starts."

"Who could forgive a dirtbag like me? I don't deserve your amnesty!"

"Can't we just kill him? Shoot him and spill his blood?"

"That's an option you could choose..."

"Works for us!"

"But who hasn't been in his shoes? It starts with "sorry"!"

"Sorry!" "Dig down deeper and say one sincere "sorry"!" "I'm so sorry!" "And your journey's underway!"

"It'll take time to cover my/your vast multitude of sins But "sorry" is where it begins It starts with "sorry"!"

Next up is a scene from my Fallout New Vegas WIP The House On Top where Ress confronts my courier Ryder, on her alliances and deals made with both arming the NCR and the Legion to propel them towards a conflict that has one of them end the other while choosing to hand over Vegas to the victor and disappear afterwards, despite how much damage and risk it would put Vegas and the Dam under, instead of choosing what benefits Vegas more. And unlike her older brother, Ress does not mince words with Ress. I believe the song below encapsulates the scene greatly, with Ress taking Velvette's lyrics and Ryder taking Carmilla's lyrics (also Zestial's lines can be given to Ore who's just awkwardly watching his sister and crush butt heads):

"Ha-ha, you've got it twisted I'm not the one who needs a new attitude Maybe you missed it, but I'm that #bitch And I will do nothing less than what I please, woo! I'm your backbone here, alright, yes-sirree! * Mad that I acted respectless? Well, it's 'cause no one could respect this

Sorry group attendin' Since when are the Vegas families too scared to fight ** You're long past trendin' Sorry, bae, but I ain't swipin' right You lost your relevance!"

"We can't act without more intelligence."

"Ugh, no wonder I'm so respectless I could eat you lot for breakfast!"

"You and your menagerie are inane and uninformed Smug nobodies who don't heed when you've been warned!"

"Oops, did I strike a nerve? 'Cause when I brought out Caesar's** head Couldn't help but observe That your wrinkled face was turning red And why are you avoidin' war? That's what the guns you sell are for Thanks to my being respectless One thing I'm starting to suspect is There's more to this plan than you're letting on* Do you have a disclosure?"

"This meeting's over!"

[* Had to omit and change these lyrics to better fit the scene. ** Changed lyrics to better fit the setting of New Vegas.]

Last song for my Far Cry New Dawn WIP Old Dusk, where Silva vows to protect her family after an encounter with one of the Highwaymen's experimental monstrosities and Azriel makes her own vow to protect her adoptive mother. Silva takes on Carmilla's lyrics while Azriel takes on Vaggie's lyrics. Listen below:

"I had thought that I could keep blood off my face* But when that thing attacked, I had to act To cross that line and keep them safe But if anyone knew, then all of Hope** would rise to war

And who's to say who'd survive the fray? I might lose the ones that I was killing for

So I, I'll be your keeper Do whatever it takes, I'll make the mistakes I'll keep you safe and keep this secret."

"When I saw your face You made me feel like a stranger in a brand new place And it felt so good to be understood But there's so much I wished that I could say

So I, I'll be your armor Do whatever it takes, I'll make no** mistakes I'll spend my life being your daughter!"**

"And I don't know what we might face But I know I can't replace you So I'll do anything to save you!"

"And I will try to make your dreams come true!" "Whatever we go through!

"I know I-!" "I'll be your keeper!" ("I'll be your armor!") "Whatever it takes!" "I'll make the mistakes." ("I'll make no** mistakes!")

"Whatever it takes!"

[*Changed this lyric up a bit since Silva's always had gotten blood on her face, but since the Collapse, she thought she could put that part of her past to rest (only to be forced to commit to it once more). ** Changed Hell to Hope for obvious setting reasons. However, I changed Azriel's "I'll make the mistakes" to "I'll make no mistakes" since I thought the distinction between Silva putting herself up for blame and danger would contrast nicely to Azriel's perfectionist mindset where she'll make sure she can protect her mother and family from harm, since she knows Silva will put herself in harms way to protect them all. Also I thought about keeping the "partner" bit as a sort of "partner-in-crime" context as homage to the Rogue Arc Silva and Azriel will go on in Silva's Hope, but ultimately changed it to "daughter" just to clear any confusion since Vaggie says "partner" in a romantic context]

[evita-shelby]

What Happens in Vegas

Thanks @zablife for the moodboard, i added the heart cake lol

@thegreatdragonfruta

It was supposed to be a pre-honeymoon trip to get away from all the stress from their royalty worthy wedding taking place in a month.

They’d met here, both of them getting shitfaced and testing their good luck before the semester began at Harvard Business College. Jack had gotten there on scholarship, busting his ass to earn his place, Eva got there because of her family’s money. At some point, they met during the endless night and woke up in bed together, forgetting how different they were.

And when they continued their fling during their two years at Harvard, things took their course. They were friends, then he needed a fake girlfriend for his eldest sister’s destination wedding in Cozumel, and when they came back to New York, she was the first woman he had ever been serious about.

He never even considered cheating on her with his boss’ slutty daughter, a thing unheard of in him. By the time they graduated, Jack knew he couldn’t live without her and proposed that same day. They ended up everywhere, which gave them a boost when they started their own investment company together. Nelson and Smith.

Now they’re taking the pink Cadillac convertible he fixed up just for her to the place it all began: Las Vegas.

“I wish I could marry you now, I’m tired of all the waiting.” He admits as the first night here leads them to the casino they met.

Neither care enough about the gambling, just telling everyone who listens that they met here and were getting married in September. They’d gotten free chips, free champagne, and an Elvis impersonator out of duty gave them his card.

“So let’s do it. You heard Elvis, the chapel’s open 24/7.” Eva, who’s impulse control is as terrible as his, says, taking out the card from his pocket.

They blow their winnings on getting ready for it with anyone present here invited to it. It is so unlike the grand event waiting for them at home that it makes it even better. Their family would hate them if the canceled the other one, for fucks sake his granny was coming from Ireland.

Eva looks amazing, a short and tight mini dress and a veil bedazzled with the words till death in black and silver rhinestones. The rings were modest, with the words Mrs. to match his that say Mr.

The cake was fucking weird though.

Eva was incredibly glamorous and cool, but she was also goth. The cake was going to be a heart shaped what happen in Vegas cake for two or two anatomically correct hearts.

Eva didn’t even wait for the guy to finish his sentence to say yes.

By dawn, they were married, and by the time they left Vegas, they had matching tattoos to commemorate their elopement.

“I’m gonna get the hearts as our wedding topper.” The newly minted Mrs. Nelson proclaimed as they left the city in the vintage car now sporting a just married sign.

[gothcsz]

I am intrigued to know more about whatever fic was being discussed in that last ask 👀

so like months ago i got the inkling to write a javi x stripper fic because… hot…. and then my brain does what it does and started building an intricate ass plot for it and thus my dear melancholy was born 🙂‍↕️ this is kinda the synopsis for it, i haven’t given it as much attention just bc i have other wips that ive been invested in but TRUST i will circle back to writing her

when your life of wealth is given to you on a silver platter; that's all you ever know. luxury. privilege. eventually it all becomes redundant, something in you yearns to leave the ivory tower and into the streets where you can become anyone you want and do whatever you want.

a beautiful socialite and youngest child of an esteemed crime family. founders of the luxurious gambling house, the ivory saints, in las vegas in the year of 1923. opening its doors during the prohibition era as a front to import, transport, and sell alcohol. from the very beginning, your family had its ties in the criminal world.

but you act out. party, blow through your trust fund, and eventually your father gets tired of your antics and cuts you off, writing you out of his will— leaving you to fend for yourself for the first time ever.

you start stripping, immediately becoming the fucking star of the joint where you dance at. that's where you meet javier peña— the new player in town. boss of the DEA branch in vegas. and so begins your tumultuous relationship with the agent; intertwining your family's criminal ties with the toxic, angsty affair you two begin.

reader is kind of an oc because of her backstory but fuck it we ball. will be written in second person POV! she's got the vibes of those early 2000s it girls— paris, nicole, kim, lindsay lohan. grew up in the spotlight then was knocked off her pedestal by her rich ass, criminal family!

[luvdsc]

i actually miss you so much here🧎🏻‍♀️

oh honey bee 🥺🤍 i miss you too 😭 thank you all soo much for all the wonderful messages everyone has sent in — there are so many of them, and i have read every single one and cried a little 🤧 i am so sorry that i don’t have the time to respond in detail to each one, but i am so so grateful and touched for all of them, and truly thank you for thinking of me 🌼 i hope you all have been doing well, and life has been treating you kindly 💛💛 it feels like coming home for the holidays after being away for so long 🥹

i finally logged back in today (after needing to reset the pw for this and for the email this blog is linked to oof) but i’m so out of the loop for kpop aside from shinee, bp, and taeyeon 🤧 i heard from alice that nct dream is touring !! 💘 i hope all of you were able to get tickets and i will live vicariously through you :’) and also hbd to renjun today !!!

a life update from me — i’ve been having the time of my life (minus some burnout from work but we won’t talk about that because it still pays the bills very well and then some), and i have long trips to japan with my friend and to australia to visit ti and steph coming up 💕 i have a fun work trip and a keshi concert with my friends including moon next month !! and i have two music festivals lined up for the summer already !!! dpr is coming to hitc nyc and i’m so sad that i’ll be out of the country when it happens but fingers crossed they come for the LA one ! and my friend just texted me a couple days ago about another music festival she randomly got tickets to so vegas here we gooo 🥳 and possibly a second vegas trip too that my other friend brought up today ??? also the usual weekend trips to LA, of course 🤩 omg and i saw jisoo irl up close at their concert and she is beautiful, and i can’t wait for her solo 🥹🫶🏻🫶🏻 and i’m currently blonde 🤧 my hair is really going through it like i first dyed it all lavender, then silver, then blonde, then i chopped it mid length and dyed it pink, then pastel pink, now it’s blonde, and it’ll be rose gold in two weeks !!! also i made like $5k from my investments and stocks, and i’m so incredibly proud of myself even though i know it’s not much compared to others :’) and i bought a chanel bag to celebrate my career milestone when i was promoted last year and got a big raise and bonus !!!! 🥳 i found the one i wanted after checking shops over the span of five months in like 8 cities and 5 countries djjdjkskd OH and i still hang out with els and she is still very much in l*ve with taeyong and jaehyun 💞 also blind boxes, specifically sanrio ones, have taken a chokehold on me thanks to els, and i’m still playing genshin so gacha addiction go brrr

tldr ; i’m really happy and content with where i’m at, and i sincerely hope from the bottom of my heart that every single one of you is experiencing the same amount, if not, even more, of happiness in your lives, honey bees 🤍🐝✨ as always, i’m sending you all my love and well wishes, ily all so so much 🌷🌷

[rabbitcruiser]

Tonopah, NV (No. 2)

Men of wealth and power entered the region to consolidate the mines and reinvest their profits into the infrastructure of the town of Tonopah. George Wingfield, a 24-year-old poker player when he arrived in Tonopah, played poker and dealt faro in the town saloons. Once he had a small bankroll, he talked Jack Carey, owner of the Tonopah Club, into taking him in as a partner and to file for a gaming license. In 1903, miners rioted against Chinese workers in Tonopah. This resulted in China enforcing a boycott in China of U.S. imported goods.

By 1904, after investing his winnings in the Boston-Tonopah Mining Company, Wingfield was worth $2 million. When old friend George S. Nixon, a banker, arrived in town, Wingfield invested in his Nye County Bank. They grub-staked (provided with food, supplies and tools in an exchange for a percentage of mine yield) miners with friend Nick Abelman, and bought existing mines. By the time the partners moved to Goldfield, Nevada and made their Goldfield Consolidated Mining Company a public corporation in 1906, Nixon and Wingfield were worth more than $30 million.

Wingfield believed that the end of the gold and silver mining production was coming and took his bankroll to Reno, where he invested heavily in real estate and casinos. Real estate and gaming became big business throughout Central Nevada. By 1910, gold production was falling and by 1920, the town of Tonopah had less than half the population it had fifteen years earlier.

Small mining ventures continued to provide income for local miners and the small town struggled on. Located about halfway between Reno and Las Vegas, it has supported travelers as a stopover and rest spot on a lonely highway. Today the Tonopah Station has slots and the Banc Club also offers some gaming.

Source: Wikipedia

[anobviousdisappointment]

Gold and Silver For Retirement

Individual Retirement Accounts (IRAs) can be supported with actual gold and silver, yet not very many investors know about this reality. They are excluded from all capital additions charges, so in the event that your investments perform above and click here to learn more beyond a significant stretch of time, it can bring about colossal savings.

Expanding your retirement portfolio with precious metals is generally required assuming you properly figure out resource allocation (see the Ibbotson study). Furthermore precious metals typically ascend during times of disrupting occasions like conflicts, psychological warfare, expansion, flattening, slumps in the stock market and the US dollar. Precious metals generally return huge profits in these conditions.

What is interesting about this plan is that you can take actual ownership of the real gold or silver when you make your withdrawals. That is right! You can cash out in truly true blue gold and silver rather than fiat dollars. This is the main element of all. Not too far off, in this generational positively trending market in gold and silver, the chances are in support of yourself that you will want and need the physicals when now is the ideal time to get to your investment.

When you decide that you want to include precious metals in your retirement arranging, you want to decide how much you want to invest. How much relies upon your yearly contribution, your own objectives and your singular investment philosophy. Elements to consider are your age, complete resources and chance resilience.

Not very many organizations are gotten up in a position handle the precious metals part of retirement plans. One of the forerunners in the field is GoldStar Trust Organization. GoldStar Trust Organization for investors who want IRAs that will acknowledge precious metals. GoldStar fills in as overseer for approximately 20,000 independent IRAs with resources in overabundance of $700 million.

GoldStar isn't a coin vendor, however it will work with sellers who trade precious metal coins and bullion for your IRA on your directions.

Laying out an IRA with GoldStar Trust Organization

Setting up a personally managed IRA with GoldStar is simple. I will talk about this at the Money Show in Las Vegas in May. Subsequently there are just three moves toward follow.

1. Present the desk work. 2. Store the account. 3. Direct your broker which precious metals to purchase.

The metals are stored at HSBC Bank USA's New York precious metals vault, which is one of the world's biggest and is utilized by COMEX and other significant products trades. Yearly storage expenses are charged at a level charge of $90 each year no matter what the size of the account.

[savvyboutique]

Timeless Style in the Silver State: Why Lady's Denim Jackets Are a Must-Have in Nevada

Few items rival the timeless appeal of a well-crafted denim jacket when it comes to versatile fashion staples. From casual daytime outings to chic evening ensembles, denim jackets have long been a wardrobe essential, especially for women who value comfort without compromising style. In Nevada, where the landscape is as diverse as its people, the ladies' denim jacket offers practicality and flair, making it a go-to choice for every occasion.

A Style That Endures

Denim jackets have stood the test of time. From their rugged origins as workwear to their evolution as a symbol of effortless cool, they continue to make waves in fashion. For women in Nevada, whose lifestyle demands adaptability, these jackets hit the perfect balance between functionality and fashion. Whether you're heading to the vibrant streets of Las Vegas or exploring the serene beauty of Lake Tahoe, a denim jacket provides a versatile outer layer that blends seamlessly with any outfit.

Nevada's climate is unique, ranging from desert heat to chilly mountain air. This variability calls for a wardrobe staple that can adapt to changing conditions, and a denim jacket is the perfect solution. Its lightweight yet durable fabric makes it ideal for layering during cooler evenings or brisk mornings, while its breathable design ensures comfort during warmer hours.

Why Ladies in Nevada Love Denim Jackets

In the heart of Nevada’s fashion scene, there is a growing appreciation for pieces that blend style and utility. A ladies' denim jacket is not just another item in your closet but a statement piece. With endless options for personalization and styling, it’s no wonder that women in Nevada always reach for this classic garment.

Boutiques like Savvy Boutique offer a curated selection of denim jackets that cater to modern tastes while keeping the timeless appeal of this classic piece. From cropped designs that pair beautifully with high-waisted skirts to oversized fits that are perfect for layering over chunky sweaters, there’s something for everyone.

Let’s not forget about practicality. Whether running errands or enjoying a concert at one of Nevada’s lively venues, a denim jacket provides a polished yet relaxed look. Pair it with sneakers for a day of exploration, or throw it over a summer dress for an effortless evening vibe. Denim jackets in Nevada have become the ultimate wardrobe ally, offering both convenience and style.

The Allure of Customization

One of the standout elements of a denim jacket is its adaptability to personal style. Many Nevada-based fashionistas embrace the opportunity to customize their jackets with embroidery, patches, or even a bit of distressing for that lived-in look. This personal touch transforms a simple jacket into a unique reflection of the wearer’s personality, making it a treasured piece in any wardrobe.

Savvy Boutique, known for its trendy and carefully curated collections, caters to this demand by offering classic and contemporary jackets. Whether you’re seeking a minimalist design or a bold statement piece, you’ll find options that resonate with your style.

Styling Tips for Every Occasion

The beauty of a ladies' denim jacket lies in its versatility. Here are some styling concepts to inspire you:

Casual Chic: Pair your denim with a white t-shirt for a relaxed yet stylish look.

Boho Vibes: Layer it over a floral maxi dress and add ankle boots for bohemian charm.

Edgy Elegance: Combine a distressed denim jacket with leather pants and statement jewelry for a night out.

Workday Ready: Throw it over a tailored blouse and pencil skirt for a smart casual office outfit.

Weekend Fun: Pair it with shorts and a tank top for outdoor activities or festivals.

No matter the occasion, a denim jacket can elevate your outfit, making it a versatile investment that pays off repeatedly.

Conclusion: A Fashion Essential for Every Nevada Woman

Having a versatile wardrobe is key in a state as dynamic as Nevada, where the day might take you from a business meeting in Reno to a sunset hike in Red Rock Canyon. A ladies' denim jacket meets this need and exceeds expectations with its blend of style, comfort, and durability. This iconic piece is an undeniable must-have, whether sourced from popular spots like Savvy Boutique or other local retailers.

Denim jackets in Nevada are more than just clothing; they celebrate individuality and practicality. Make one a part of your wardrobe today, and experience its timeless charm and endless possibilities.

[laurencna]

Open Your Future: Top CNA Classes in Las Vegas for Aspiring Healthcare Heroes

Unlock Your Future: Top CNA Classes in Las Vegas for ‍Aspiring ‌Healthcare Heroes

Are you ready to embark‍ on ⁤a fulfilling ⁤career in healthcare? Becoming a Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA) ​in Las ⁤Vegas offers a direct ‍route into a ⁣rewarding profession where you make a genuine difference in people’s lives. This article ‍will guide you through‍ the top CNA classes in las Vegas, the benefits⁢ of pursuing a CNA license, ‌essential tips⁢ for ‌success, and⁣ more.

Why ⁢Choose a CNA Career in ⁤Las⁣ Vegas?

The demand for ⁤Certified⁤ Nursing Assistants⁤ is ‌increasing rapidly⁤ as the healthcare sector grows. Las vegas, known ⁢for its bustling healthcare industry, provides a ⁣plethora of⁢ opportunities for aspiring CNAs. ‍Here are a few reasons to consider ‍a CNA career:

Job Security: With a growing ‌senior population, the need for healthcare services continues to rise.

Entry-Level Position: ​CNA training programs are relatively short, allowing⁢ you to ⁣enter the workforce quickly.

Flexible ‌Hours: Many healthcare facilities offer flexible shifts, making it easier to balance work and life.

Hands-On Experience: ‍CNAs play a vital role in⁣ patient care, providing valuable ⁤direct experience in the healthcare field.

Top CNA Classes in ⁢las Vegas

Finding the right CNA ⁤training program is crucial for your success.Here’s a compiled list of some of the best CNA classes in Las vegas:

Institution

Location

Program​ Duration

contact ​Info

Vegas College

Las Vegas, NV

4 Weeks

(702) 685-4900

College of Southern Nevada

Las Vegas, NV

8 Weeks

(702) ‍651-4000

Nevada Career Institute

Las Vegas, NV

4 Weeks

(702) 248-4500

Silver State college

las Vegas,‌ NV

6 Weeks

(702) 860-7050

Benefits of Taking CNA‍ Classes

Investing in a CNA program‌ can offer several advantages:

affordable Tuition: CNA classes⁣ are generally less⁣ expensive ‍than ⁤degree programs.

Fast⁤ Track to Employment: With ⁤training lasting from⁢ a few‍ weeks to a couple of months, you can start working soon.

Practical Skills Development: Gain real-world skills through hands-on training and clinical experience.

Networking ⁣opportunities: Meet‍ industry professionals and ‍peers who can definitely help you‍ in your career journey.

Practical ⁣Tips for⁣ Success in ⁤CNA Training

To thrive in your CNA classes, ‍consider these practical tips:

Stay Organized: Keep track of ⁣assignments, ⁣tests, and‌ clinical hours.

Participate⁢ Actively: ⁣Engage ‍in discussions and ask questions ‍to enhance your understanding.

Practise skills Regularly: ‍Regularly practice your hands-on skills to build confidence.

Seek Help When Needed: Don’t hesitate to ask instructors‍ for assistance if ‍you encounter challenges.

Real-Life Experiences: Testimonials from CNAs

Consider learning from those who have already embarked‌ on this journey. Here are insights from two CNAs:

Emily’s Journey

“I chose to become a CNA because I wanted to make a ⁢difference. The training was ⁤intense, but‌ the⁣ instructors were incredibly supportive. My first job ⁣at a local nursing home taught ⁢me so much about compassionate care.”

Mark’s Experience

“After completing my CNA‌ classes, I landed a ‌job at⁣ a hospital that offered great ‍benefits and ⁤opportunities for advancement. The flexibility of my CNA role allows me to continue ‍my ⁣education while working.”

Preparing⁣ for‌ the CNA Certification Exam

Once ⁤you complete your training,passing the ‌CNA certification exam is your next step. Here are some preparation tips:

Review Course Materials: Go through your notes and​ textbooks regularly.

Take Practice Tests: familiarize yourself ⁢with⁣ the exam format through practice tests available ⁣online.

Join ​Study Groups: Collaborate with classmates⁤ to study and discuss key concepts.

Stay ⁣Calm⁢ and Confident: Remember that preparation is key to overcoming‍ exam anxiety.

Conclusion: Your Future Awaits in Healthcare

Embarking on ⁤the path to becoming a ⁣Certified Nursing Assistant in Las⁢ Vegas can be one of the most rewarding decisions you make. With ⁤quality CNA classes, numerous job opportunities, ⁣and⁣ the ability to ​positively impact the lives ⁣of patients, the future ‍is shining for ‌aspiring⁢ healthcare heroes. Take your first step today by⁢ enrolling ⁢in one ⁣of the outstanding CNA programs⁤ available in⁤ Las Vegas!

https://trainingcna.org/open-your-future-top-cna-classes-in-las-vegas-for-aspiring-healthcare-heroes/

[iragoldproof]

Discover the benefits of investing in silver with IranGoldProof. Our expert guidance and premium silver products offer a reliable path to diversify your portfolio and safeguard your wealth. Learn about market trends, investment strategies, and how to get started today with trusted silver investment options.

[silverstateappraisers]

Silver State Appraisers are the trusted experts when it comes to Las Vegas real estate appraisal. Our team of experienced appraisers ensures that you have the most up-to-date and comprehensive information to make informed decisions about your property. We provide accurate and reliable appraisals to help you make informed decisions about your real estate investments.

Silver State Appraisers 5524 Sentinal Bridge St. Las Vegas, NV 89130 (702) 808–6608

My Official Website: https://www.silverstateappraisers.com/ Google Plus Listing: https://www.google.com/maps?cid=5587089633419689717

Service We Offer:

Appraisals for residential properties Multi-use property Appraisals New Construction Appraisals Land Appraisals Valuations for Estate, Divorce or Tax Rent Survey and Operating Income Statements Recertification of Value Multi Family Income Properties

Follow Us On:

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[5mybestarticles]

Trumped: the multi-million-dollar lawsuit over Toronto’s most controversial new condo-hotel

The Trump tower, downtown’s tallest new condo-hotel, is a monument to excess. And, like its tycoon namesake, it’s surrounded by controversy: 38 investors are suing the hotel for millions. Lessons from a post-crash real estate market

In the city’s new five-star hotel landscape, the Ritz represents elegant European classicism, the Shangri-La cool, Asian chic, and the Trump unfettered American pomp. Like its loud-mouthed namesake, the Trump is brash, proud and full of bluster. Stock, the hotel’s restaurant and bar, is outfitted with shiny tufted black leather seating and silver accents. Its lobby, a shimmering expanse of marble and mirrors, seems sprung, fully formed, from the imagination of Joan Collins.

The hotel’s developer, Talon International, is run by Val Levitan and Alex Shnaider, two Russian-Canadian entrepreneurs. Levitan made his fortune manufacturing slot machines and creating bank note validation technology, and Shnaider earned his in the post-glasnost steel trade. The Trump is their first Toronto real estate venture. In 2002, during a meeting in Shnaider’s office at Dufferin and Finch, they agreed on a plan to build the city’s biggest, fanciest, five-starriest hotel. They both travel frequently for work and agreed that Toronto’s hotels lacked the quality of the ones they stayed at in London, New York and Moscow. Back then, Toronto’s swankiest option was the old Four Seasons, a dour brutalist tower in Yorkville. But the city was emerging as a major North American financial centre, a place where serious players were coming to do big international deals. These titans were in need of boardrooms in which to meet, bloody steaks to consume, and high-thread-count sheets to sleep between.

In 2004, Talon bought a site at the corner of Bay and Adelaide for $27.4 million. The location was perfect—smack in the centre of the business district. This was before the cultural revitalization of the city’s downtown core, but Levitan and Shnaider could see the signs: the revamping of the Bay’s flagship department store, the plans for the new Bell Lightbox, not to mention a phalanx of condos and restaurants springing up in the city centre. By the time the hotel was completed, it would be the anchor point of a tourist-friendly downtown.

The luxury hotel required a famous brand, which is how the pair ended up approaching Donald Trump. At the time, Trump’s reality show The Apprentice was riding high in the ratings, and the Trump brand was associated with luxury, success and business prowess, not with headline-making Twitter spats and an aborted Republican leadership bid. They worked out a deal to license the Trump name.

They planned a 65-storey mixed-use building consisting of a restaurant and bar, a day spa, 118 condos—some as large as 4,400 square feet and selling for up to $9.1 million—and 261 “condo-hotel suites,” traditional hotel rooms that Talon intended to sell as residential real estate investments. The condo-hotel set-up was unusual in Toronto. It’s an attractive model for developers because it allows them to raise capital up front from investors.

Donald Trump is a shareholder in other Trump developments in Chicago, New York and Las Vegas, but not in Toronto. The hotel would bear his name and his style, and an affiliate of his management company would run the day-to-day hotel service. According to the early marketing brochures, it would be a model for “Manhattan-style luxury living in Toronto.”

By the time the Trump opened in 2012, ten years after the plan was hatched and more than two years later than originally scheduled, the financial climate had, of course, drastically changed. The hotel now felt like a throwback to a cockier, pre-recession era, back when hedge fund managers ruled the world and Bernie Madoff was a respected financial guru. A group of buyers now regret their investment in the building, and millions of dollars in deals between them and Talon are on the verge of collapsing. The group claims their condo-hotel units often sit empty, and they’ve launched a series of lawsuits alleging the Trump sales team misrepresented how much profit they’d make. The defendants say the lawsuits have no merit, that no misrepresentations were made. The claims have yet to be heard in court.

The Trump investors believed they’d bought into a get-rich-quick scheme. How did something so promising go so wrong?

Before there was the Trump Tower, there was the Trump tower sales office, a glass-fronted box that stood on the same prime corner from which the hotel would eventually rise. A polished young sales team sold a steady stream of units, over the phone, online and in person, to a diverse cross-section of buyers—including elderly Korean pensioners, wealthy Nigerians and a now-defunct U.K. company called WorldWide Properties, which bought four floors of hotel units with the intention of flipping them.

When the Trump broke ground, half of the residential condos had sold, as had 191 of the condo-hotel units, which ranged in price from $736,000 to $3.8 million. The suites could be rented out as part of the hotel, providing extra income to buyers. In the Trump system, occupancies are organized in a strict, computerized rotation, which ensures that the least rented room jumps to the front of the queue. The hotel charges service fees for maintenance (linens, towels, cleaning, etc.) and management, but the rest of the rental profit goes to the owner of the room. The promotional material declared that “investing in hotel suites is a trend that’s sweeping the United States… The reason? Great cash flows, no concern for maintenance and reasonable cash requirements as a down payment. Leverage is key, especially in these times of low interest rates.”

[chrisfrominvis]

Trumped: the multi-million-dollar lawsuit over Toronto’s most controversial new condo-hotel

The Trump tower, downtown’s tallest new condo-hotel, is a monument to excess. And, like its tycoon namesake, it’s surrounded by controversy: 38 investors are suing the hotel for millions. Lessons from a post-crash real estate market

In the city’s new five-star hotel landscape, the Ritz represents elegant European classicism, the Shangri-La cool, Asian chic, and the Trump unfettered American pomp. Like its loud-mouthed namesake, the Trump is brash, proud and full of bluster. Stock, the hotel’s restaurant and bar, is outfitted with shiny tufted black leather seating and silver accents. Its lobby, a shimmering expanse of marble and mirrors, seems sprung, fully formed, from the imagination of Joan Collins.

The hotel’s developer, Talon International, is run by Val Levitan and Alex Shnaider, two Russian-Canadian entrepreneurs. Levitan made his fortune manufacturing slot machines and creating bank note validation technology, and Shnaider earned his in the post-glasnost steel trade. The Trump is their first Toronto real estate venture. In 2002, during a meeting in Shnaider’s office at Dufferin and Finch, they agreed on a plan to build the city’s biggest, fanciest, five-starriest hotel. They both travel frequently for work and agreed that Toronto’s hotels lacked the quality of the ones they stayed at in London, New York and Moscow. Back then, Toronto’s swankiest option was the old Four Seasons, a dour brutalist tower in Yorkville. But the city was emerging as a major North American financial centre, a place where serious players were coming to do big international deals. These titans were in need of boardrooms in which to meet, bloody steaks to consume, and high-thread-count sheets to sleep between.

In 2004, Talon bought a site at the corner of Bay and Adelaide for $27.4 million. The location was perfect—smack in the centre of the business district. This was before the cultural revitalization of the city’s downtown core, but Levitan and Shnaider could see the signs: the revamping of the Bay’s flagship department store, the plans for the new Bell Lightbox, not to mention a phalanx of condos and restaurants springing up in the city centre. By the time the hotel was completed, it would be the anchor point of a tourist-friendly downtown.

The luxury hotel required a famous brand, which is how the pair ended up approaching Donald Trump. At the time, Trump’s reality show The Apprentice was riding high in the ratings, and the Trump brand was associated with luxury, success and business prowess, not with headline-making Twitter spats and an aborted Republican leadership bid. They worked out a deal to license the Trump name.

They planned a 65-storey mixed-use building consisting of a restaurant and bar, a day spa, 118 condos—some as large as 4,400 square feet and selling for up to $9.1 million—and 261 “condo-hotel suites,” traditional hotel rooms that Talon intended to sell as residential real estate investments. The condo-hotel set-up was unusual in Toronto. It’s an attractive model for developers because it allows them to raise capital up front from investors.

Donald Trump is a shareholder in other Trump developments in Chicago, New York and Las Vegas, but not in Toronto. The hotel would bear his name and his style, and an affiliate of his management company would run the day-to-day hotel service. According to the early marketing brochures, it would be a model for “Manhattan-style luxury living in Toronto.”

By the time the Trump opened in 2012, ten years after the plan was hatched and more than two years later than originally scheduled, the financial climate had, of course, drastically changed. The hotel now felt like a throwback to a cockier, pre-recession era, back when hedge fund managers ruled the world and Bernie Madoff was a respected financial guru. A group of buyers now regret their investment in the building, and millions of dollars in deals between them and Talon are on the verge of collapsing. The group claims their condo-hotel units often sit empty, and they’ve launched a series of lawsuits alleging the Trump sales team misrepresented how much profit they’d make. The defendants say the lawsuits have no merit, that no misrepresentations were made. The claims have yet to be heard in court.

The Trump investors believed they’d bought into a get-rich-quick scheme. How did something so promising go so wrong?

Before there was the Trump Tower, there was the Trump tower sales office, a glass-fronted box that stood on the same prime corner from which the hotel would eventually rise. A polished young sales team sold a steady stream of units, over the phone, online and in person, to a diverse cross-section of buyers—including elderly Korean pensioners, wealthy Nigerians and a now-defunct U.K. company called WorldWide Properties, which bought four floors of hotel units with the intention of flipping them.

When the Trump broke ground, half of the residential condos had sold, as had 191 of the condo-hotel units, which ranged in price from $736,000 to $3.8 million. The suites could be rented out as part of the hotel, providing extra income to buyers. In the Trump system, occupancies are organized in a strict, computerized rotation, which ensures that the least rented room jumps to the front of the queue. The hotel charges service fees for maintenance (linens, towels, cleaning, etc.) and management, but the rest of the rental profit goes to the owner of the room. The promotional material declared that “investing in hotel suites is a trend that’s sweeping the United States… The reason? Great cash flows, no concern for maintenance and reasonable cash requirements as a down payment. Leverage is key, especially in these times of low interest rates.”

Promotions featured an airbrushed picture of Trump, along with a personal endorsement: “We’re going to do something very special in Toronto.” Trump himself, the ad said, “has an undeniably keen eye for a deal.” The ad neglected to mention that Trump wasn’t the project’s developer, just its smiling face.

Sarbjit Singh, a 49-year-old warehouse supervisor from Milton, was one of the early buyers. Singh first heard about the Trump in October 2006 from a real estate agent who told him it was a great investment opportunity. He and his wife, Kimberly, had recently bought a house and just had their second daughter. He didn’t have the money to buy another property. “I was only making between $50,000 and $60,000 a year,” he says. “I’m a regular person, not rich.”

But the prospect of getting his own piece of Trump magic proved too tempting. He claims the agents at the Trump sales centre told him he couldn’t possibly lose money since the “absolute worst case scenario” was that the hotel ended up at 55 per cent occupancy, and even then the projected returns were healthy. “I asked them a long list of questions,” he recalls. Who was going to arrange the mortgages? What would the interest rate be? Would the property be categorized as commercial or residential (commercial properties come with much higher interest rates). He alleges the sales associate assured him he had nothing to worry about. According to Singh, they said Talon was already working on financing with lenders, and it would all go smoothly. The units would qualify for residential mortgages. Singh then asked at what point he could flip the unit, and the agent told him directly after closing. “You’ll make a lot of money,” he remembers the agent telling him. “Even if you don’t sell, you’ll be making lots of money from the reservation program.”

Armed with Talon’s projection sheet, his head dancing with trust funds for his daughters, Singh went to his mother and father, who are retired and living on a pension. He convinced them to take out a $150,000 line of credit on their house, which they owned outright, so he could put down a deposit of $173,400 on an $869,000 suite. He believed, like many other investors I spoke to, that he was buying a piece of real estate directly from Donald Trump and that he couldn’t lose. “I bought it on the strength of his name alone. He’s Donald Trump—hotels and real estate are his business, not mine. I trusted that it would work.”

Construction of the Trump Tower got off to an inauspicious start. It took two years to receive planning permission from the city, and there were more delays after Talon broke ground in late 2007. Because of the site’s small footprint—15,000 square feet—only one crane could be employed at a time. Shnaider admitted it was a bit of a nightmare. “I wouldn’t do such a project again in Toronto,” he said. More significantly for investors, the economic reality changed. As Levitan put it, “It was a very complicated project that became delayed, and in that time the economy fell apart. How can I control that?” In the new market, the projection sheets Talon had distributed with the initial sales package weren’t worth the creamy stationery they were printed on.

In March 2012, Sarbjit Singh took possession of his unit and started paying monthly fees of $8,207, which covered realty taxes, common fees and interest. He expected his rental profits to more than offset the fees, but when the first revenue statements came in, he knew something was wrong: in four months, his unit had been rented 49 times—roughly a 40 per cent occupancy rate and lower than the “absolute worst case scenario” the agent had discussed with him. Singh’s room was running at a loss. When he called hotel management, they told him the bad news: because of the dampened hotel market, they’d been renting his room out at a discounted rate. (Rooms at the Trump that were forecast to cost $550 to $600 per night have been available for $400 on Expedia.) Singh was losing approximately $5,000 a month.

His problems didn’t end there. He visited several major banks and was told the property was commercial, not residential, and thus he’d need a commercial mortgage, for which he’d need to put 50 per cent down—money he didn’t have. Even if he could find the down payment, the commercial interest rates would raise his mortgage payments beyond what he could afford to carry.

Last November, Singh ran out of reserve cash. He stopped paying his fees and is now working in the evenings and on weekends in an effort to pay his parents’ line of credit. He recently missed a mortgage payment. He has no idea how he’ll get out of debt.

Singh retained the Toronto law firm Heydary Hamil­ton last November and filed a suit against the developers. Another 37 buyers have also filed suits. A Heydary lawyer named Mitchell Wine, one of the team of 14 lawyers and articling students working on the Trump cases, told me purchasers and representatives of more than 100 units have contacted his office. The firm has filed statements of claim detailing each of the investors’ stories and accusing Talon and other named parties of misrepresentation, breaches of the Ontario Securities Act, breach of contract, breach of the Condominium Act and conspiracy. Each claimant is asking for well over a million dollars in damages, plus their deposit money back with interest. Pleadings are being finalized, and preliminary motions were scheduled to be heard just after this issue went to press. In response, Talon is seeking to have the action by investors dismissed.

The investors’ suits name Trump Toronto Hotel Management Group and Talon International Inc., as well as Trump, Shnaider and Levitan personally. They allege that the defendants misled investors about the units by providing financial projections that overstated how much they would earn, and by understating expenses (such as occupancy fees). According to the investors’ statements of claim, Talon breached the Ontario Securities Act by selling the units as investment products.

The plaintiffs’ cases centre on a 2004 OSC ruling, which required Talon to market the units as mainly for occupancy, not as investments. Talon was also prohibited from forecasting or guaranteeing profits from the reservation program. And yet, included in the Trump’s original sales package are several charts entitled Estimated Return on Investment, which show detailed breakdowns of the income buyers could expect from their condo-hotel suites. They describe projected common expense fees, housekeeping expenses, estimated taxes and a mortgage projected at six per cent interest. The rental income, in turn, is projected at hotel occupancy rates of 75, 65 and 55 per cent.

Late last year, the OSC investigated the Trump deal to determine whether regulatory action was needed. They met with purchasers and Talon’s lawyers, read over all the documents, and in early December announced they would not be pursuing regulatory action on the matter. When I asked for an explanation, the OSC refused to provide one. The investors’ suits will proceed regardless of the December decision.

The fact is, Talon did warn the Trump buyers about the risks involved in buying condo-hotel units in its disclosure. “A real estate investment is, by its nature, speculative,” the document states. “If a purchaser is purchasing the real estate as an investment, the purchaser should be aware that this investment has not only the usual risks when purchasing real estate, but also those risks that are inherent to the nature of real estate securities.”

A disclaimer in the Trump disclosure lists a series of variables, many of which might seem alarmist if they hadn’t come to pass. These include, but are not limited to, “cyclical downturns arising from real changes in general and local economic conditions; varying levels of demand for rooms and related services caused by changes in travel patterns; the financial condition of the airline industry and the resulting impact on air travel…contagious illness outbreaks, natural disasters, extreme weather conditions, labour shortages, work stoppages or disputes.” There is also a clause, as required by the Condominium Act, stating that each buyer, upon receiving and reading the disclosure document, has 10 days to back out of the deal. According to Levitan, five people did just that.

Investors like Singh claim they didn’t take the warnings about risks seriously because they’d been completely convinced that the investment was a sure bet. It’s a bit like your trusted GP prescribing you a medication and then rattling off the side effects in a super-fast radio ad voice as you leave the office. If what these buyers say is true, the Trump sales team underplayed the risks and overplayed the benefits of buying their condo-hotel units. But sales pitches are hyperbolic by design.

Talon’s statement of defence denies all wrongdoing, including the allegations of misrepresentation and breaching an OSC ruling, and demands the investors forfeit their deposits and pay individual damages of $750,000 each. Levitan says they have a good case for further damages, due to all the bad press the case has received, but they are still “hoping for an amicable solution.”

In Talon’s specific response to Singh’s claim, the company denies that the Trump sales agents promised he could get a residential mortgage or guaranteed a rate of return from the reservation program. It also denies that any promotional material he received breached the OSC ruling. In Levitan’s view, the buyers’ lawsuits are purely opportunistic and won’t stand up in court. Normally, if buyers want to walk away from a deal, a developer will buy back their investment. But the Trump units were sold at the peak of the market. As Levitan points out, “Everything has changed.” Given this reality, Talon is not eager to buy back the units it sold off for millions in the middle of the condo boom. That’s how people—and developers—make money: buying low and selling high. Why should they absorb the cost of others’ bad financial timing?

The group of disgruntled buyers, Levitan says, is primarily composed of people who did not attempt to rescind the deal in the allotted time frame, then realized they couldn’t secure financing and decided to file suit. The fact that they don’t have the money to close only shows that they probably shouldn’t have taken the risk in the first place. “Instead they claim that they thought they were buying from Donald Trump and we promised them a rose garden,” Levitan says with a snort. “It’s a pure form of extortion.”

He says he’s sad for the people who got in over their heads. He’d prefer “the world to be a rosy place in which people are always happy with their investments,” but that didn’t happen with Trump. “So what am I supposed to do?” he says. “Go to the drywall contractor and say, ‘Sorry, but I can’t pay you because 30 investors aren’t paying me?’ ”

Raymond Diep, a Toronto real estate lawyer at the firm Aaron & Aaron, which handled a number of the Trump condo-hotel closings, said his firm’s clients weren’t happy about losing money each month, but they chose to take a long-term view on the investment. “They realized that things might be negative now, but in the end the market would go up again.”

None of Aaron & Aaron’s clients were going to go personally bankrupt on the Trump deal; they absorbed their losses and decided to wait it out. Diep believes the Heydary lawyers are cashing in on private desperation. “They’re making it look like a shady investment, but it’s not really like that. The investors had high expectations. It was the height of the market. Now that it’s slowed down, they’re having regrets about it. It’s that simple.”

Sarbjit Singh, who is in no position to close in cash, says that Talon should have said that only investors of high net worth need apply. Instead, the Trump project was sold as a great investment for people of modest means, like himself. “If you need to be a millionaire to close, they should have targeted millionaires.”

Donald Trump declined to speak with me, but Ivanka, his daughter, agreed. The 32-year-old is vice-president of development and acquisitions for the Trump Organization. When I reached her, she was in the back of a chauffeur-driven car on the way to the airport. “It was very important to me to give you some time,” she said the moment she got on the phone. Ivanka is a glamorous blond jewellery designer and former model with a business degree from Wharton. Over the years, her father has used her as the new face of Trump, trotting her out at public events and even appointing her as a judge on The Apprentice.

Ivanka is an excellent human shield for her father, who is no stranger to lawsuits. He has been sued by investors on several hotel projects and has launched his own litany of suits against a long list of perceived offenders, including an unauthorized biographer, a former Miss U.S.A. contestant, Deutsche Bank and the comedian Bill Maher, who offered, on The Tonight Show, to pay Trump $5 million if he could prove his father was not an orangutan. Trump sent him a copy of his birth certificate, but Maher did not pay up.

Ivanka said she is staggered by the investors’ claims that they believed they were buying their units directly from Trump.

“I don’t know of many people who wouldn’t retain a lawyer to explain to them how this relationship works,” she says. “It’s articulated exactly in the purchase documents… We’re just like the Ritz or the Four Seasons. It’s not different in any way.”

She says the claims against her father and his company are completely without merit. When I point out that people were led to believe they would make money and now they are losing it—and, similarly, that they would be able to secure financing where now they cannot—Ivanka bridles, her voice rising in the controlled manner of one who is used to conflict but not to having her authority questioned. She points out, quite rightly, that with any investment, whatever the asset class, and especially with real estate, those who approach things with a long-term perspective tend to do best. She says the unhappy buyers in the Trump Toronto case are suffering from a severe case of buyer’s remorse—which is nobody’s problem but their own.

She objects to the implication that the investors were misled in any way, and each time I try to suggest that perhaps the sales tactics were overly aggressive, she jumps in and loudly talks over me, extolling what she calls “the beauty of the asset,” by which she means the hotel itself.

“I wish that everyone could be happy, but sometimes these things can be a challenge,” she says airily. “It’s important to remember that the lawsuit doesn’t relate to us in any way. We have no contracts with these people, and we didn’t sell them real estate.” With that, she declares she must go, says a quick goodbye and hangs up.

[marshallstrue]

Trumped: the multi-million-dollar lawsuit over Toronto’s most controversial new condo-hotel

The Trump tower, downtown’s tallest new condo-hotel, is a monument to excess. And, like its tycoon namesake, it’s surrounded by controversy: 38 investors are suing the hotel for millions. Lessons from a post-crash real estate market

In the city’s new five-star hotel landscape, the Ritz represents elegant European classicism, the Shangri-La cool, Asian chic, and the Trump unfettered American pomp. Like its loud-mouthed namesake, the Trump is brash, proud and full of bluster. Stock, the hotel’s restaurant and bar, is outfitted with shiny tufted black leather seating and silver accents. Its lobby, a shimmering expanse of marble and mirrors, seems sprung, fully formed, from the imagination of Joan Collins.

The hotel’s developer, Talon International, is run by Val Levitan and Alex Shnaider, two Russian-Canadian entrepreneurs. Levitan made his fortune manufacturing slot machines and creating bank note validation technology, and Shnaider earned his in the post-glasnost steel trade. The Trump is their first Toronto real estate venture. In 2002, during a meeting in Shnaider’s office at Dufferin and Finch, they agreed on a plan to build the city’s biggest, fanciest, five-starriest hotel. They both travel frequently for work and agreed that Toronto’s hotels lacked the quality of the ones they stayed at in London, New York and Moscow. Back then, Toronto’s swankiest option was the old Four Seasons, a dour brutalist tower in Yorkville. But the city was emerging as a major North American financial centre, a place where serious players were coming to do big international deals. These titans were in need of boardrooms in which to meet, bloody steaks to consume, and high-thread-count sheets to sleep between.

In 2004, Talon bought a site at the corner of Bay and Adelaide for $27.4 million. The location was perfect—smack in the centre of the business district. This was before the cultural revitalization of the city’s downtown core, but Levitan and Shnaider could see the signs: the revamping of the Bay’s flagship department store, the plans for the new Bell Lightbox, not to mention a phalanx of condos and restaurants springing up in the city centre. By the time the hotel was completed, it would be the anchor point of a tourist-friendly downtown.

The luxury hotel required a famous brand, which is how the pair ended up approaching Donald Trump. At the time, Trump’s reality show The Apprentice was riding high in the ratings, and the Trump brand was associated with luxury, success and business prowess, not with headline-making Twitter spats and an aborted Republican leadership bid. They worked out a deal to license the Trump name.

They planned a 65-storey mixed-use building consisting of a restaurant and bar, a day spa, 118 condos—some as large as 4,400 square feet and selling for up to $9.1 million—and 261 “condo-hotel suites,” traditional hotel rooms that Talon intended to sell as residential real estate investments. The condo-hotel set-up was unusual in Toronto. It’s an attractive model for developers because it allows them to raise capital up front from investors.

Donald Trump is a shareholder in other Trump developments in Chicago, New York and Las Vegas, but not in Toronto. The hotel would bear his name and his style, and an affiliate of his management company would run the day-to-day hotel service. According to the early marketing brochures, it would be a model for “Manhattan-style luxury living in Toronto.”

By the time the Trump opened in 2012, ten years after the plan was hatched and more than two years later than originally scheduled, the financial climate had, of course, drastically changed. The hotel now felt like a throwback to a cockier, pre-recession era, back when hedge fund managers ruled the world and Bernie Madoff was a respected financial guru. A group of buyers now regret their investment in the building, and millions of dollars in deals between them and Talon are on the verge of collapsing. The group claims their condo-hotel units often sit empty, and they’ve launched a series of lawsuits alleging the Trump sales team misrepresented how much profit they’d make. The defendants say the lawsuits have no merit, that no misrepresentations were made. The claims have yet to be heard in court.

The Trump investors believed they’d bought into a get-rich-quick scheme. How did something so promising go so wrong?

Before there was the Trump Tower, there was the Trump tower sales office, a glass-fronted box that stood on the same prime corner from which the hotel would eventually rise. A polished young sales team sold a steady stream of units, over the phone, online and in person, to a diverse cross-section of buyers—including elderly Korean pensioners, wealthy Nigerians and a now-defunct U.K. company called WorldWide Properties, which bought four floors of hotel units with the intention of flipping them.

When the Trump broke ground, half of the residential condos had sold, as had 191 of the condo-hotel units, which ranged in price from $736,000 to $3.8 million. The suites could be rented out as part of the hotel, providing extra income to buyers. In the Trump system, occupancies are organized in a strict, computerized rotation, which ensures that the least rented room jumps to the front of the queue. The hotel charges service fees for maintenance (linens, towels, cleaning, etc.) and management, but the rest of the rental profit goes to the owner of the room. The promotional material declared that “investing in hotel suites is a trend that’s sweeping the United States… The reason? Great cash flows, no concern for maintenance and reasonable cash requirements as a down payment. Leverage is key, especially in these times of low interest rates.”

Promotions featured an airbrushed picture of Trump, along with a personal endorsement: “We’re going to do something very special in Toronto.” Trump himself, the ad said, “has an undeniably keen eye for a deal.” The ad neglected to mention that Trump wasn’t the project’s developer, just its smiling face.

Sarbjit Singh, a 49-year-old warehouse supervisor from Milton, was one of the early buyers. Singh first heard about the Trump in October 2006 from a real estate agent who told him it was a great investment opportunity. He and his wife, Kimberly, had recently bought a house and just had their second daughter. He didn’t have the money to buy another property. “I was only making between $50,000 and $60,000 a year,” he says. “I’m a regular person, not rich.”

But the prospect of getting his own piece of Trump magic proved too tempting. He claims the agents at the Trump sales centre told him he couldn’t possibly lose money since the “absolute worst case scenario” was that the hotel ended up at 55 per cent occupancy, and even then the projected returns were healthy. “I asked them a long list of questions,” he recalls. Who was going to arrange the mortgages? What would the interest rate be? Would the property be categorized as commercial or residential (commercial properties come with much higher interest rates). He alleges the sales associate assured him he had nothing to worry about. According to Singh, they said Talon was already working on financing with lenders, and it would all go smoothly. The units would qualify for residential mortgages. Singh then asked at what point he could flip the unit, and the agent told him directly after closing. “You’ll make a lot of money,” he remembers the agent telling him. “Even if you don’t sell, you’ll be making lots of money from the reservation program.”

Armed with Talon’s projection sheet, his head dancing with trust funds for his daughters, Singh went to his mother and father, who are retired and living on a pension. He convinced them to take out a $150,000 line of credit on their house, which they owned outright, so he could put down a deposit of $173,400 on an $869,000 suite. He believed, like many other investors I spoke to, that he was buying a piece of real estate directly from Donald Trump and that he couldn’t lose. “I bought it on the strength of his name alone. He’s Donald Trump—hotels and real estate are his business, not mine. I trusted that it would work.”

Construction of the Trump Tower got off to an inauspicious start. It took two years to receive planning permission from the city, and there were more delays after Talon broke ground in late 2007. Because of the site’s small footprint—15,000 square feet—only one crane could be employed at a time. Shnaider admitted it was a bit of a nightmare. “I wouldn’t do such a project again in Toronto,” he said. More significantly for investors, the economic reality changed. As Levitan put it, “It was a very complicated project that became delayed, and in that time the economy fell apart. How can I control that?” In the new market, the projection sheets Talon had distributed with the initial sales package weren’t worth the creamy stationery they were printed on.

In March 2012, Sarbjit Singh took possession of his unit and started paying monthly fees of $8,207, which covered realty taxes, common fees and interest. He expected his rental profits to more than offset the fees, but when the first revenue statements came in, he knew something was wrong: in four months, his unit had been rented 49 times—roughly a 40 per cent occupancy rate and lower than the “absolute worst case scenario” the agent had discussed with him. Singh’s room was running at a loss. When he called hotel management, they told him the bad news: because of the dampened hotel market, they’d been renting his room out at a discounted rate. (Rooms at the Trump that were forecast to cost $550 to $600 per night have been available for $400 on Expedia.) Singh was losing approximately $5,000 a month.

His problems didn’t end there. He visited several major banks and was told the property was commercial, not residential, and thus he’d need a commercial mortgage, for which he’d need to put 50 per cent down—money he didn’t have. Even if he could find the down payment, the commercial interest rates would raise his mortgage payments beyond what he could afford to carry.

Last November, Singh ran out of reserve cash. He stopped paying his fees and is now working in the evenings and on weekends in an effort to pay his parents’ line of credit. He recently missed a mortgage payment. He has no idea how he’ll get out of debt.

Singh retained the Toronto law firm Heydary Hamil­ton last November and filed a suit against the developers. Another 37 buyers have also filed suits. A Heydary lawyer named Mitchell Wine, one of the team of 14 lawyers and articling students working on the Trump cases, told me purchasers and representatives of more than 100 units have contacted his office. The firm has filed statements of claim detailing each of the investors’ stories and accusing Talon and other named parties of misrepresentation, breaches of the Ontario Securities Act, breach of contract, breach of the Condominium Act and conspiracy. Each claimant is asking for well over a million dollars in damages, plus their deposit money back with interest. Pleadings are being finalized, and preliminary motions were scheduled to be heard just after this issue went to press. In response, Talon is seeking to have the action by investors dismissed.

The investors’ suits name Trump Toronto Hotel Management Group and Talon International Inc., as well as Trump, Shnaider and Levitan personally. They allege that the defendants misled investors about the units by providing financial projections that overstated how much they would earn, and by understating expenses (such as occupancy fees). According to the investors’ statements of claim, Talon breached the Ontario Securities Act by selling the units as investment products.

The plaintiffs’ cases centre on a 2004 OSC ruling, which required Talon to market the units as mainly for occupancy, not as investments. Talon was also prohibited from forecasting or guaranteeing profits from the reservation program. And yet, included in the Trump’s original sales package are several charts entitled Estimated Return on Investment, which show detailed breakdowns of the income buyers could expect from their condo-hotel suites. They describe projected common expense fees, housekeeping expenses, estimated taxes and a mortgage projected at six per cent interest. The rental income, in turn, is projected at hotel occupancy rates of 75, 65 and 55 per cent.

Late last year, the OSC investigated the Trump deal to determine whether regulatory action was needed. They met with purchasers and Talon’s lawyers, read over all the documents, and in early December announced they would not be pursuing regulatory action on the matter. When I asked for an explanation, the OSC refused to provide one. The investors’ suits will proceed regardless of the December decision.

The fact is, Talon did warn the Trump buyers about the risks involved in buying condo-hotel units in its disclosure. “A real estate investment is, by its nature, speculative,” the document states. “If a purchaser is purchasing the real estate as an investment, the purchaser should be aware that this investment has not only the usual risks when purchasing real estate, but also those risks that are inherent to the nature of real estate securities.”

A disclaimer in the Trump disclosure lists a series of variables, many of which might seem alarmist if they hadn’t come to pass. These include, but are not limited to, “cyclical downturns arising from real changes in general and local economic conditions; varying levels of demand for rooms and related services caused by changes in travel patterns; the financial condition of the airline industry and the resulting impact on air travel…contagious illness outbreaks, natural disasters, extreme weather conditions, labour shortages, work stoppages or disputes.” There is also a clause, as required by the Condominium Act, stating that each buyer, upon receiving and reading the disclosure document, has 10 days to back out of the deal. According to Levitan, five people did just that.

Investors like Singh claim they didn’t take the warnings about risks seriously because they’d been completely convinced that the investment was a sure bet. It’s a bit like your trusted GP prescribing you a medication and then rattling off the side effects in a super-fast radio ad voice as you leave the office. If what these buyers say is true, the Trump sales team underplayed the risks and overplayed the benefits of buying their condo-hotel units. But sales pitches are hyperbolic by design.

Talon’s statement of defence denies all wrongdoing, including the allegations of misrepresentation and breaching an OSC ruling, and demands the investors forfeit their deposits and pay individual damages of $750,000 each. Levitan says they have a good case for further damages, due to all the bad press the case has received, but they are still “hoping for an amicable solution.”

In Talon’s specific response to Singh’s claim, the company denies that the Trump sales agents promised he could get a residential mortgage or guaranteed a rate of return from the reservation program. It also denies that any promotional material he received breached the OSC ruling. In Levitan’s view, the buyers’ lawsuits are purely opportunistic and won’t stand up in court. Normally, if buyers want to walk away from a deal, a developer will buy back their investment. But the Trump units were sold at the peak of the market. As Levitan points out, “Everything has changed.” Given this reality, Talon is not eager to buy back the units it sold off for millions in the middle of the condo boom. That’s how people—and developers—make money: buying low and selling high. Why should they absorb the cost of others’ bad financial timing?

The group of disgruntled buyers, Levitan says, is primarily composed of people who did not attempt to rescind the deal in the allotted time frame, then realized they couldn’t secure financing and decided to file suit. The fact that they don’t have the money to close only shows that they probably shouldn’t have taken the risk in the first place. “Instead they claim that they thought they were buying from Donald Trump and we promised them a rose garden,” Levitan says with a snort. “It’s a pure form of extortion.”

He says he’s sad for the people who got in over their heads. He’d prefer “the world to be a rosy place in which people are always happy with their investments,” but that didn’t happen with Trump. “So what am I supposed to do?” he says. “Go to the drywall contractor and say, ‘Sorry, but I can’t pay you because 30 investors aren’t paying me?’ ”

Raymond Diep, a Toronto real estate lawyer at the firm Aaron & Aaron, which handled a number of the Trump condo-hotel closings, said his firm’s clients weren’t happy about losing money each month, but they chose to take a long-term view on the investment. “They realized that things might be negative now, but in the end the market would go up again.”

None of Aaron & Aaron’s clients were going to go personally bankrupt on the Trump deal; they absorbed their losses and decided to wait it out. Diep believes the Heydary lawyers are cashing in on private desperation. “They’re making it look like a shady investment, but it’s not really like that. The investors had high expectations. It was the height of the market. Now that it’s slowed down, they’re having regrets about it. It’s that simple.”

Sarbjit Singh, who is in no position to close in cash, says that Talon should have said that only investors of high net worth need apply. Instead, the Trump project was sold as a great investment for people of modest means, like himself. “If you need to be a millionaire to close, they should have targeted millionaires.”

Donald Trump declined to speak with me, but Ivanka, his daughter, agreed. The 32-year-old is vice-president of development and acquisitions for the Trump Organization. When I reached her, she was in the back of a chauffeur-driven car on the way to the airport. “It was very important to me to give you some time,” she said the moment she got on the phone. Ivanka is a glamorous blond jewellery designer and former model with a business degree from Wharton. Over the years, her father has used her as the new face of Trump, trotting her out at public events and even appointing her as a judge on The Apprentice.

Ivanka is an excellent human shield for her father, who is no stranger to lawsuits. He has been sued by investors on several hotel projects and has launched his own litany of suits against a long list of perceived offenders, including an unauthorized biographer, a former Miss U.S.A. contestant, Deutsche Bank and the comedian Bill Maher, who offered, on The Tonight Show, to pay Trump $5 million if he could prove his father was not an orangutan. Trump sent him a copy of his birth certificate, but Maher did not pay up.

Ivanka said she is staggered by the investors’ claims that they believed they were buying their units directly from Trump.

“I don’t know of many people who wouldn’t retain a lawyer to explain to them how this relationship works,” she says. “It’s articulated exactly in the purchase documents… We’re just like the Ritz or the Four Seasons. It’s not different in any way.”

She says the claims against her father and his company are completely without merit. When I point out that people were led to believe they would make money and now they are losing it—and, similarly, that they would be able to secure financing where now they cannot—Ivanka bridles, her voice rising in the controlled manner of one who is used to conflict but not to having her authority questioned. She points out, quite rightly, that with any investment, whatever the asset class, and especially with real estate, those who approach things with a long-term perspective tend to do best. She says the unhappy buyers in the Trump Toronto case are suffering from a severe case of buyer’s remorse—which is nobody’s problem but their own.

She objects to the implication that the investors were misled in any way, and each time I try to suggest that perhaps the sales tactics were overly aggressive, she jumps in and loudly talks over me, extolling what she calls “the beauty of the asset,” by which she means the hotel itself.

“I wish that everyone could be happy, but sometimes these things can be a challenge,” she says airily. “It’s important to remember that the lawsuit doesn’t relate to us in any way. We have no contracts with these people, and we didn’t sell them real estate.” With that, she declares she must go, says a quick goodbye and hangs up.

[dirtymoneyenough]

Trumped: the multi-million-dollar lawsuit over Toronto’s most controversial new condo-hotel

The Trump tower, downtown’s tallest new condo-hotel, is a monument to excess. And, like its tycoon namesake, it’s surrounded by controversy: 38 investors are suing the hotel for millions. Lessons from a post-crash real estate market

In the city’s new five-star hotel landscape, the Ritz represents elegant European classicism, the Shangri-La cool, Asian chic, and the Trump unfettered American pomp. Like its loud-mouthed namesake, the Trump is brash, proud and full of bluster. Stock, the hotel’s restaurant and bar, is outfitted with shiny tufted black leather seating and silver accents. Its lobby, a shimmering expanse of marble and mirrors, seems sprung, fully formed, from the imagination of Joan Collins.

The hotel’s developer, Talon International, is run by Val Levitan and Alex Shnaider, two Russian-Canadian entrepreneurs. Levitan made his fortune manufacturing slot machines and creating bank note validation technology, and Shnaider earned his in the post-glasnost steel trade. The Trump is their first Toronto real estate venture. In 2002, during a meeting in Shnaider’s office at Dufferin and Finch, they agreed on a plan to build the city’s biggest, fanciest, five-starriest hotel. They both travel frequently for work and agreed that Toronto’s hotels lacked the quality of the ones they stayed at in London, New York and Moscow. Back then, Toronto’s swankiest option was the old Four Seasons, a dour brutalist tower in Yorkville. But the city was emerging as a major North American financial centre, a place where serious players were coming to do big international deals. These titans were in need of boardrooms in which to meet, bloody steaks to consume, and high-thread-count sheets to sleep between.

In 2004, Talon bought a site at the corner of Bay and Adelaide for $27.4 million. The location was perfect—smack in the centre of the business district. This was before the cultural revitalization of the city’s downtown core, but Levitan and Shnaider could see the signs: the revamping of the Bay’s flagship department store, the plans for the new Bell Lightbox, not to mention a phalanx of condos and restaurants springing up in the city centre. By the time the hotel was completed, it would be the anchor point of a tourist-friendly downtown.

The luxury hotel required a famous brand, which is how the pair ended up approaching Donald Trump. At the time, Trump’s reality show The Apprentice was riding high in the ratings, and the Trump brand was associated with luxury, success and business prowess, not with headline-making Twitter spats and an aborted Republican leadership bid. They worked out a deal to license the Trump name.

They planned a 65-storey mixed-use building consisting of a restaurant and bar, a day spa, 118 condos—some as large as 4,400 square feet and selling for up to $9.1 million—and 261 “condo-hotel suites,” traditional hotel rooms that Talon intended to sell as residential real estate investments. The condo-hotel set-up was unusual in Toronto. It’s an attractive model for developers because it allows them to raise capital up front from investors.

Donald Trump is a shareholder in other Trump developments in Chicago, New York and Las Vegas, but not in Toronto. The hotel would bear his name and his style, and an affiliate of his management company would run the day-to-day hotel service. According to the early marketing brochures, it would be a model for “Manhattan-style luxury living in Toronto.”

By the time the Trump opened in 2012, ten years after the plan was hatched and more than two years later than originally scheduled, the financial climate had, of course, drastically changed. The hotel now felt like a throwback to a cockier, pre-recession era, back when hedge fund managers ruled the world and Bernie Madoff was a respected financial guru. A group of buyers now regret their investment in the building, and millions of dollars in deals between them and Talon are on the verge of collapsing. The group claims their condo-hotel units often sit empty, and they’ve launched a series of lawsuits alleging the Trump sales team misrepresented how much profit they’d make. The defendants say the lawsuits have no merit, that no misrepresentations were made. The claims have yet to be heard in court.

The Trump investors believed they’d bought into a get-rich-quick scheme. How did something so promising go so wrong?

Before there was the Trump Tower, there was the Trump tower sales office, a glass-fronted box that stood on the same prime corner from which the hotel would eventually rise. A polished young sales team sold a steady stream of units, over the phone, online and in person, to a diverse cross-section of buyers—including elderly Korean pensioners, wealthy Nigerians and a now-defunct U.K. company called WorldWide Properties, which bought four floors of hotel units with the intention of flipping them.

When the Trump broke ground, half of the residential condos had sold, as had 191 of the condo-hotel units, which ranged in price from $736,000 to $3.8 million. The suites could be rented out as part of the hotel, providing extra income to buyers. In the Trump system, occupancies are organized in a strict, computerized rotation, which ensures that the least rented room jumps to the front of the queue. The hotel charges service fees for maintenance (linens, towels, cleaning, etc.) and management, but the rest of the rental profit goes to the owner of the room. The promotional material declared that “investing in hotel suites is a trend that’s sweeping the United States… The reason? Great cash flows, no concern for maintenance and reasonable cash requirements as a down payment. Leverage is key, especially in these times of low interest rates.”

Promotions featured an airbrushed picture of Trump, along with a personal endorsement: “We’re going to do something very special in Toronto.” Trump himself, the ad said, “has an undeniably keen eye for a deal.” The ad neglected to mention that Trump wasn’t the project’s developer, just its smiling face.

Sarbjit Singh, a 49-year-old warehouse supervisor from Milton, was one of the early buyers. Singh first heard about the Trump in October 2006 from a real estate agent who told him it was a great investment opportunity. He and his wife, Kimberly, had recently bought a house and just had their second daughter. He didn’t have the money to buy another property. “I was only making between $50,000 and $60,000 a year,” he says. “I’m a regular person, not rich.”

But the prospect of getting his own piece of Trump magic proved too tempting. He claims the agents at the Trump sales centre told him he couldn’t possibly lose money since the “absolute worst case scenario” was that the hotel ended up at 55 per cent occupancy, and even then the projected returns were healthy. “I asked them a long list of questions,” he recalls. Who was going to arrange the mortgages? What would the interest rate be? Would the property be categorized as commercial or residential (commercial properties come with much higher interest rates). He alleges the sales associate assured him he had nothing to worry about. According to Singh, they said Talon was already working on financing with lenders, and it would all go smoothly. The units would qualify for residential mortgages. Singh then asked at what point he could flip the unit, and the agent told him directly after closing. “You’ll make a lot of money,” he remembers the agent telling him. “Even if you don’t sell, you’ll be making lots of money from the reservation program.”

Armed with Talon’s projection sheet, his head dancing with trust funds for his daughters, Singh went to his mother and father, who are retired and living on a pension. He convinced them to take out a $150,000 line of credit on their house, which they owned outright, so he could put down a deposit of $173,400 on an $869,000 suite. He believed, like many other investors I spoke to, that he was buying a piece of real estate directly from Donald Trump and that he couldn’t lose. “I bought it on the strength of his name alone. He’s Donald Trump—hotels and real estate are his business, not mine. I trusted that it would work.”

Construction of the Trump Tower got off to an inauspicious start. It took two years to receive planning permission from the city, and there were more delays after Talon broke ground in late 2007. Because of the site’s small footprint—15,000 square feet—only one crane could be employed at a time. Shnaider admitted it was a bit of a nightmare. “I wouldn’t do such a project again in Toronto,” he said. More significantly for investors, the economic reality changed. As Levitan put it, “It was a very complicated project that became delayed, and in that time the economy fell apart. How can I control that?” In the new market, the projection sheets Talon had distributed with the initial sales package weren’t worth the creamy stationery they were printed on.

In March 2012, Sarbjit Singh took possession of his unit and started paying monthly fees of $8,207, which covered realty taxes, common fees and interest. He expected his rental profits to more than offset the fees, but when the first revenue statements came in, he knew something was wrong: in four months, his unit had been rented 49 times—roughly a 40 per cent occupancy rate and lower than the “absolute worst case scenario” the agent had discussed with him. Singh’s room was running at a loss. When he called hotel management, they told him the bad news: because of the dampened hotel market, they’d been renting his room out at a discounted rate. (Rooms at the Trump that were forecast to cost $550 to $600 per night have been available for $400 on Expedia.) Singh was losing approximately $5,000 a month.

His problems didn’t end there. He visited several major banks and was told the property was commercial, not residential, and thus he’d need a commercial mortgage, for which he’d need to put 50 per cent down—money he didn’t have. Even if he could find the down payment, the commercial interest rates would raise his mortgage payments beyond what he could afford to carry.

Last November, Singh ran out of reserve cash. He stopped paying his fees and is now working in the evenings and on weekends in an effort to pay his parents’ line of credit. He recently missed a mortgage payment. He has no idea how he’ll get out of debt.

Singh retained the Toronto law firm Heydary Hamil­ton last November and filed a suit against the developers. Another 37 buyers have also filed suits. A Heydary lawyer named Mitchell Wine, one of the team of 14 lawyers and articling students working on the Trump cases, told me purchasers and representatives of more than 100 units have contacted his office. The firm has filed statements of claim detailing each of the investors’ stories and accusing Talon and other named parties of misrepresentation, breaches of the Ontario Securities Act, breach of contract, breach of the Condominium Act and conspiracy. Each claimant is asking for well over a million dollars in damages, plus their deposit money back with interest. Pleadings are being finalized, and preliminary motions were scheduled to be heard just after this issue went to press. In response, Talon is seeking to have the action by investors dismissed.

to be continued...