Stanley I. Chera, Prominent Jewish Philanthropist And Real Estate Mogul, Succumbs To Coronavirus

NEW YORK (VINnews) — Stanley I. Chera, a prominent Jewish philanthropist and developer who succeeded in turning his father’s Brooklyn department store business into one of New York real estate’s biggest retail empires and later used his wealth to support the presidency bid of Donald Trump, has died from complications of the coronavirus at the age of 78.

President Trump had advised Chera to leave corona-stricken New York City and stay at his Deal, New Jersey summer residence. Chera listened to his friend’s advice but unfortunately fell sick and was admitted to New York Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center in late March. According to a source familiar with events, Chera’s wife, Frieda (Cookie) also contracted the virus, but she recovered.

Trump considered him a close friend and mentioned him many times in his speeches. Recently he singled Chera out when discussing how he had realized the seriousness of COVID-19:

“When you send a friend to the hospital, and you call up to find out how is he doing — it happened to me, where he goes to the hospital, he says goodbye,” Trump said. “He’s sort of a tough guy. A little older, a little heavier than he’d like to be, frankly. And you call up the next day: ‘How’s he doing?’ And he’s in a coma? This is not the flu.”

It was not the first time that Trump had referred to Chera. At a briefing a few days earlier he said, “I have some friends that are unbelievably sick. We thought they were going in for a mild stay. And, in one case, he’s unconscious — in a coma. And you say, ‘How did that happen?”

Chera was a prominent member of the Syrian Jewish community in New York. Those who knew the billionaire real estate developer were quick to heap praise on the business genius whose life revolved around giving charity and spending time with his family. Chera was press-shy and rarely gave interviews, but in one interview he revealed the strategy which had led him to success in the real estate world: Simple-long term investments in assets with no over-leveraging, never borrowing more than 25-35% of the purchase price. In  2010 Chera told the New York Times, “I have 100 pieces of property, but I could have 1,000 leveraged.” In that same conversation he revealed his disinterest in clothing, saying he buys 10 suits in 15 minutes.

Jewish Voice reporter Lieba Nesis described Chera as “self deprecating, quiet, unassuming and generous to a fault. Chera was always the behind the scene mover and shaker donating millions to Rabin Medical Center, National Jewish Health, and charities for special needs children. He also gave nearly a quarter of a million to the Trump campaign, introducing the President at the Veterans Day Parade in November 2019. He was soft spoken, short of words and quiet in temperament. You never saw his name splashed on the front pages of The Real Deal or the Wall Street Journal-he was the guy sitting unassumingly at the table surrounded by his three sons (who are heading the business) and copious amounts of grandchildren.”

Nesis added that “the irony that the term “Corona” which means crown in Latin so named for the spiked-like proteins of the virus, mimics the name of his company “Crown Acquistions” is the ultimate tragedy in a story of a giant whose life was stolen much too soon.”

Chera and his sons own Crown Acquisitions. Chera has also done business with the family of Trump’s son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner, partnering with the Carlyle Group and Kushner Companies in 2008 for a $525 million deal to acquire and reposition the retail at 666 Fifth Avenue.

A close friend of both Chera and the president, real estate investor Steve Witkoff,  recalled gatherings that brought multiple generations of Cheras together in Deal, N.J, and remarked that Chera had managed to maintain a large, powerful united family even as other dynasties had split in feuds. “The most compelling quality about him,” Witkoff said, “with all the deals, all the success, is how he held that incredible family together.”