当代世界贫富差距悬殊的真实写照：纽约公园大道432号

    “现在只有两个市场：超级豪宅市场和补贴房市场。”——公园大道432号建筑设计师拉斐尔•维诺利

    在纽约市公园大道上，第56号与第57号街道间，有一栋摩天大楼高耸入云，此楼之高，估计就连金刚也会望而却步。

    该楼屋顶层高约0.25英里（约402米），使得此楼成为纽约最高建筑，也是整个西半球最高的住宅楼。

    这座96层的大厦总高约1396英尺（约425米），在整个曼哈顿已是俯视群楼，比帝国大厦（Empire State Building）还要高出约150英尺。哪怕不算其尖顶，此栋超级豪宅也要高出新建的世界金融中心（World Financial Center）28英尺。从纽约市所有的5个区，你都能看到公园大道432号，不仅如此，你还能从沿着哈莱姆河驶入纽约的大都会北方铁路（Metro-North）列车上看到它，从新泽西州的Meadowlands看到它，从长岛（Long Island）的几个高点都能看到它。不论从哪个角度看，高耸入云的公园大道432号都带着几分遗世独立的味道。从来没有哪栋住宅楼像公园大道432号这样引人瞩目。

    不过，公园大道432号最引人注目的，并非其大块头，而是在这栋内部使用面积高达40万平方英尺（约3.7万平方米）的高楼里，居然只有104套住宅。简言之，公园大道432号是全球超富阶层崛起的历史见证物。它是史无前例的收入不平等现象堆出来的摩天大厦。

    我们的故事始于2009年，当时有一家名为CIM的私募股权公司，该公司总部位于洛杉矶，此时尚名不见经传。金融危机后，公司三位管理合伙人，一位是前德崇（Drexel Burnham）银行家，还有两位是前以色列伞兵，他们带着钱悄悄来到遭受重创的曼哈顿房地产市场。CIM迅速开出支票，救助纽约市最负盛名的房地产家族和企业，当时，许多项目已经暂停，资金几乎枯竭。这三位外乡客一夜之间成为曼哈顿的重量级人物。

    与黑石（Blackstone）和加州公务员退休基金（Calpers）等投资机构的过硬关系，使得这家位于美国西海岸的企业，能利用纽约市数十年难得一见的机遇，当时，纽约市的企业大都因之前的繁荣过度举债。CIM公司为多个备受瞩目、出现问题的房产项目提供资金，并允许原开发商作为CIM的合作伙伴继续参与项目。

    到2011年，CIM已经无处不在。当时，经济正缓慢改善，金融界开始回暖，机构投资者又开始投资。正是在这种复苏的大环境下，公园大道432号这样雄心勃勃的项目才得以诞生，并获得资金。

    哈里•麦克洛是房地产行业最著名、最有趣的人物之一。他个性十足，手头有众多房产和项目。麦克洛喜欢赌博和冒险。2008年，随着房地产市场开始崩溃，纽约十年过度挥霍的后果开始显现，麦克洛发现自己处境有些不妙。一桩杠杆率极高、获得德意志银行（Deutsche Bank）58亿美元贷款的房地产交易，使得麦克洛成为新闻人物，而麦克洛在几处重要房产【比如通用汽车大厦（General Motors Building）】中的股份，据称已经岌岌可危。

    就在此时，CIM挺身而出，为麦克洛多个陷入困境的项目提供融资，双方就此建立合作关系，这才有了后来开创性的公园大道432号。到2011年8月，公园大道432号大厦的惊人计划——此项目将在拆毁的麦克洛名下德雷克酒店（Drake Hotel）原址上建造——开始在Curbed和《纽约观察家》（The New York Observer）等房地产新闻网站上出现。哈里•麦克洛这样的绝处逢生者，与“神秘”外来开发商合作的戏码，对爱侃侃而谈的人士而言，是极为诱人的故事情节。

    “There are only two markets, ultraluxury and subsidized housing.” —Rafael Viñoly, architect of 432 Park Avenue

    Along a stretch of New York City’s Park Avenue, between 56th and 57th Street, soars a tower so jaw-droppingly altitudinous that King Kong himself would likely think twice before scaling it.

    Its rooftop, roughly a quarter of a mile high, makes it the tallest building in New York and the highest residential tower in the western hemisphere.

    At 96 stories (1,396 feet), it has no company in the space it occupies atop Manhattan’s skyline. The Empire State Building tops out some 150 feet below that. Absent its spire, the newly built World Financial Center—itself a giant—is 28 feet shorter than this new cathedral to uber-wealth. 432 Park Avenue can be seen from all five boroughs of New York City, from inbound Metro-North trains coming in along the Harlem River, from the Meadowlands in New Jersey, and from several vantage points on Long Island. Its lone silhouette dominates the skyline from every angle. It demands your attention in a way that no residential building ever has.

    The most remarkable thing about 432 Park, however, is not just its sheer size. It is the fact that, in a building so tall and imposing, with over 400,000 square feet of usable interior space, there are only 104 units for people to live in. 432 Park Avenue is, in short, a monument to the epic rise of the global super-wealthy. It is the house that historic inequality built.

    Our story begins in 2009 with a little-known Los Angeles-based private equity firm called CIM. The firm’s three managing partners, a former Drexel Burnham banker and a pair of former Israeli paratroopers, quietly dropped in on Manhattan’s punch drunk post-financial crisis real estate market with money to spend. CIM moved quickly, writing checks to bail out some of the city’s most prestigious real estate families and firms, as projects were stalling and financing had all but dried up. The outsiders became Manhattan power players overnight.

    Strong relationships with investment organizations like Blackstone and Calpers put the west coast-based firm in a position to capitalize on a once-in-a-generation opportunity in a city where the incumbents were largely overleveraged from the prior boom. They acted as the bank behind the resurrection of several high-profile distressed properties, and allowed the original developers to stay involved with each deal as their partners.

    By 2011, CIM was everywhere. The economy was slowly improving, the financial firmament was beginning to thaw, and institutional investors were cutting checks again. It is in this recovering environment that a project as ambitious as 432 Park Avenue can even be dreamed of, let alone funded.

    Harry Macklowe is one of the real estate industry’s most famous and colorful characters, with a massive portfolio of properties and projects to go along with his outsize personality. No stranger to gambles and calculated risks, Macklowe found himself in a bit of a squeeze in 2008, as the seams of the property market began to tear and the bills from New York’s decade of excess came due. A highly leveraged real estate transaction backed by a $5.8 billion loan from Deutsche Bank kept his name in the news, and his stake in several trophy properties, like the General Motors Building, were said to have been in jeopardy.

    CIM stepped into the breach, providing financing for several of Macklowe’s troubled projects, and a partnership was born that would lead to the groundbreaking at 432 Park. By August 2011, their incredible plans for the tower—which would occupy the land where the Macklowe-owned Drake Hotel had been demolished—began to leak onto real estate news sites like Curbed and The New York Observer. The idea of a “fifth-act” survivor like Harry Macklowe partnering with a “mysterious” developer from out of town proved to be an irresistible storyline to the chattering classes.