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TR U M P STR A TEGI ES FO R R E A L ESTA TE

safety to the conservative bankers, and this is exactly what Trump
did when he sat down at the table with Pearce at his side. Instead of
seeing a 27-year-old asking for millions of dollars, the bankers
saw Trump with someone they had been dealing with for years—
even though the reality was that he was just a temporary hired gun
for Trump.
An even better example of Trump’s showmanship is the way
he used flashy architecture to get people excited about the
Commodore-Hyatt deal. Using eye-catching, conversation-starting
architecture is one of Trump’s signature tactics, and it’s something
every real estate investor, no matter how small, should consider
doing. A good design and some flashy ideas from an architect can
easily add far more value to a project than the cost of the architect’s
fee. If you can create something impressive and distinctive, you will
be able to get premium rents or a premium selling price for your
property.
Trump felt that the Commodore was going down hill because it
looked so dark and dingy. His plan was to build a new façade directly
over the building’s old skeletal structure in glass, or bronze if that
was feasible, otherwise he would demolish the existing building and
build a new one. It had to embody “showmanship”—a building with
sparkle and excitement that would make people stop and notice. He
hired a young, talented architect named Der Scutt, to help him real-
ize this vision.
Next, Trump used showmanship to get New York City to agree
to a massive 40-year tax abatement in order to make this deal work,
and instead, take a share of the profits. This was a critical piece of
his plan. But Trump knew that convincing the politicians and bu-
reaucrats in New York City government to go along with this plan
would be extremely difficult. To imagine that the run-down Com-
modore Hotel, mostly vacant and mired in unpaid property taxes,
could evolve into one of the busiest and most luxurious hotels in

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